Logan's Legacy
by AbsoluteOmega
Summary: FINISHED! X23 centered fic with lots of guest appearances. The battle has begun, who will be the victor, X23 or the facility that created her? One thing is clear, she's not going down without a hell of a fight.
1. Default Chapter

**Logan's Legacy  
**  
A/N: Like it says in my bio, this is my first fanfic. I don't expect you to be nice, but at least be polite. If you tell me something is bad or wrong, please tell me how to fix it, not just that it is bad. Also, if any of you people are more of a net wizard than I am or know of some good sites for x-men info, would you please tell me. Thanks. Oh yeah, I don't own most of these characters. Sigh  
  
Chapter One: Shadow's Kiss  
  
The building loomed up black, blotting out the moon behind it so that it seemed to have a halo around it. Good. The darkness would be helpful. The girl had been worried about that when she'd originally thought of this plan. Then again, she had been trained by the best, but in turn, best not to get cocky.  
  
_ Look at them, the fools. Anyone could take them out with six quick shots and a silencer. They wouldn't even have time to sound an alarm._ She thought in regards to the guards. _That must mean surveillance, cameras, people, something I can't readily see from back here. Doesn't matter._ Something cracked behind her. Someone was coming. Perfect. A shadow barged through the underbrush. The dark amorphous shape that turned right and left frantically searching.   
  
"I could have sworn something, someone was here." The girl watched the shadow. She suddenly had a better plan, though not as much fun, for her anyway. She had perched in a tree and now made ready to pounce like a cat pounces on string. _Fool, why does no one ever think to look above?_ From the depths of her memory, a voice came droning back at her, swamping her with lessons she wished she sometimes could forget.   
  
_ Humans do not expect attack from above while they are ground, for they have no reason to expect it. The sky is a realm in which they have no domain, so they do not understand, as they do not know. They have never been hunted from the sky, so they do not expect to be hunted from the sky.  
_  
She could smell the man's fear. _Rookie_ and with that she crashed into his shoulders snapping his spine as she went, leaping off at the last vital second to land on her feet. _Sorry kid_. She thought as she quickly stripped him of his uniform. _Please don't have a family anywhere_. She stopped. She would not think like this. If this was going to work, nothing was going to touch her. She knew what she had to do, and damn it! She would do it. It was owed to her. _Right_ she mentally said as she took a deep breath and walked out of the brush and into the clearing.  
  
"Halt! Who are you?"  
  
"Guard 90365 Alpha reporting for rounds." She was thankful that she'd been casing the place for the past month and a half now. She was also thankful that she had good night vision or she would have had to fumble for her id number. That was how they kept people from breaking in. Each guard was issued a uniform once a week with a new id number on it. There was no way to fake knowing the id number because they changed all of the time. She knew how the system worked and consequently knew where all of the flaws and loopholes were.   
  
"Oh, you must be the new guy." The first guard said. Good thing these uniforms came with hats. She had stuffed all her hair up into it, so she looked somewhat masculine in the two-large uniform. They thought she was a guy. Great.  
  
"Go to the south part of the building. Oh, and rookie, hope your not scared of the dark." She just smirked to herself. _Please, I am a child of the night_. She couldn't help but think to herself. To be honest, she almost couldn't stand the light.  
  
She strode around the building to the south side. This was almost too perfect. There was a window that lead to an unused office on this side of the building that she'd been planning on getting in through. She paused. It felt too much like a trap, but if she didn't get in now, she never would. She always had been a gambling girl, part of the reason she'd been deemed unusable. Just thinking about it made her angry. _Calm down, get a grip. Smash stuff later_. And people said she needed anger management classes.   
  
She hoisted herself up on the windowsill and after some difficult maneuvering she managed to get it open and landed inside with a quiet but discernible thud. She froze. Despite all her training, her heart began to pound. Breathe, just breathe. She couldn't smell or hear anyone. She cautiously moved to the door and cracked it open. She couldn't see anyone. She moved into the hallway and began to count doors. One...two...three...four...twenty...twenty-one...twenty-two...twenty-three. _My lucky number_. She opened the door and strode down the hallway bordered on both sides with glass walls. She ducked into the bathroom right outside of the office she would need. She knew all this because she had looked up the city plans at City Hall. What wasn't listed at City Hall she hacked off of the inter-net.  
  
She stripped off the uniform. She was decked in black from her head to her toes. Black jeans, black combat boots, black t-shirt and leather jacket to top off the ensemble. She looked like every wannabe punk off the street, not to mention the stereotypical movie persona of a bad ass, and why not? She was a bad ass. She left the bathroom and slipped into the office. She got behind the computer, cracked her knuckles and got started.   
  
One and a Half Hours Later  
  
She was halfway through hacking into Stryker's database. She had to bypass his voice recognition program and then hack through the codes protecting the back doors into the system. Suddenly Stryker's database was on the screen. She scrolled through the database. There were at least a thousand mutants listed here. If there was anything to be said about Stryker, bastard that he was, he was at least a very thorough bastard.  
  
She clicked on the file titled "Weapon X." Immediately several other aliases such as Logan and Wolverine popped up wanting to know, which documents she wanted to examine. She uploaded the file Logan. She scrolled down the page until she saw the subheading of Current Address. She logged it away in her brain. _So he think he can hide in a school. Too bad he was never very good at academics._ To the right, in the corner was a photograph. _Logan!_ Mentally she was screaming, but to anyone who could have seen her at the moment, she looked absolutely calm, so still you weren't sure if she was alive. She was clenching her hands so tight she feared she might actually break her own fingers. He vision was taking on a crimson shade.  
  
She was standing outside in the hall, the one with all the doors she had counted on the way in. She couldn't remember how she'd gotten out here. _Shit!_ She cursed herself. _Did I hurt anyone?_ She didn't think this out of concern for anyone else, she was concerned for herself. If she had hurt someone, there would be more people coming to take her down. _Double Shit! Maybe I do need those anger management classes after all_. She couldn't sense any alarm, but just to be sure, she walked up to the nearest camera and waved. It didn't matter if they had her picture or not. The spikey blonde haired punk they saw waving to the camera with distinct pale features and green eyes was not what she normally looked like. Then again, she never normally looked like anything. Just for good measure, she smashed the camera.  
  
Immediately an alarm went off. _Good. Now for the fun part_. She ran towards the front door. No point in trying to be subtle now. She slammed into the first guard as he charged her from down the hallway. The second guard went for her head but she was too quick for him. She ducked the punch and kicked him in the crotch. Too bad for him that she had good aim, some would even say deadly.   
  
"Automatic lockdown commenced." She ran for the door and just as the guards started firing their guns, she dropped into a skid, rolling on the other side of the door as it slammed down and surged to her feet. She scanned the room quickly. Then crouching, hugging herself to the wall she eased up to the last corner. She smelled people, at least two, no more than three. Then they began talking into their radios, and she knew she only had two guards left. If she went out now, it would be a stand off. _Screw this crap! I don't have time for it_. She pulled out her gun and shot one neat hole in each guards head.   
  
"Have a nice day boys." She blew them a kiss as she simply walked out the door and was swallowed by the shadows, and the comforting embrace of the night.


	2. Memories

Chapter 2: Memories  
  
The well built, lanky man tossed and turned on top of the sheets. He was still wearing the jeans and white tank top he'd been wearing during the day. He'd lost his shoes and socks somewhere along the way to the bed. A thin sheen of sweat graced his temples. Whatever he was dreaming about disturbed him, maybe even scared him.  
  
_ He walked down the dark hall. There were no doors, save one at the end. The door was cracked open and light spilled out in a soft play against the floor. From behind the door came a child's voice. Whoever it was, they were humming some sort of tune that probably had words that only they would know. It seemed like such a sad song for a child to be humming. Like whoever was humming was forcing back tears. He finally made it into the room. This place was dated. The wallpaper looked as though it could have belonged on the wall of a 1950's kitchen. The television in the corner looked as though it belonged in the 60's and the carpeting was that disgusting shag in lime green that had seemed so appealing during the 70's.  
  
Late afternoon sunlight streamed through the windows and illuminated the room in patches. Everything was shown in black and white and grey. He never dreamed in color. A tiny girl, maybe about four or five, sat in the middle of the room brushing a doll's hair as she sang a song he couldn't hear the words to. In fact, it seemed as soon as he'd entered the room, all sound had stopped. The girl's lips still moved, but there was no noise. Her incredibly long hair hid her face so that all he saw was half of a profile. He tried to get a closer look at her, but it was as if the harder he tried to see her, the less of her he saw. Suddenly she turned and began to crawl towards him, all that hair forever enshrouding her face.  
  
"Logan, don't leave me. Please don't leave me here. I'm scared." Her whispered woods screamed eerily in the silence. Their sudden sound startling him. "You promised." She whimpered. The echo of that final phrase continued as the girl slowly raised her head. "You promised." It was both an accusation and a plea. She had no face. Logan let out a yell and backed away. Blood slowly began to run from her eyes, her nose, her mouth. "You promised." The room was falling away behind him, or he was getting dragged backwards. The girl slowly began to morph. Her hair shortened and lightened. Her face narrowed, she grew taller, and suddenly he was looking into Jean's eyes. It was her voice begging him to stay.  
He backed all the way out of the hallway and the door slammed shut, closing on the desperate cries of whoever was inside. He was standing on a porch. He turned around and walked down the stairs and out to the driveway. He looked to see where he was. The house had white siding and three windows facing this direction. He remembered the window in the back room had been a bay window complete with a window seat. The roof was shingled with something strange. An old, rusted car leaned drunkenly against one side of the house. From somewhere he had the vague sense that he'd seen this before; that he'd been here before.  
_  
Logan awoke with a start, breathing hard. He rubbed his head and grunted in pain. Ever since that run in with Stryker earlier this year at the base, memories had come back. The only problem was they came back in fragments and he was having a hard time putting them together. It was like trying to put together a snow globe, he put pieces together, but when he tried to fill back with water, he found he still had cracks. He sat up and looked at the clock that glowed from across the room. _4:30, great_. He may as well get up now. _I won't be sleeping any more tonight.  
_ He got up and made his way downstairs. The Institute was quiet. It was something strange for a school that he knew housed several insomniacs, himself included. The school bore the silence like an ill fitted suit. Usually one of the younger ones was up suffering from nightmares of people trying to come and take them away in the night. It was times like these Logan wished the government would see, that they were just kids. They were too scared to hurt anyone with their powers, they didn't even want to use them for fear of hurting themselves. It hadn't helped when earlier in the year a group of trained military men had stormed the school in hopes of doing god knows what to the children along with stealing Cerebro.  
Cerebro was a machine that the professor, Charles Xaivier, the owner of the school as well as being one of the most powerful mutants ever, made. It allowed him to use his powerful mind to track down mutants by finding their brainwaves, or at least that's about all Logan understood about it. Stryker had wanted to use Cerebro to kill all the mutants. That never happened. Despite what Stryker had done, Logan had wished he'd had more time to get some answers from him. Maybe even pummeled a couple of answers out of the bastard.  
Logan had made his way down to the kitchen and plopped down in a chair. Christ he wanted a beer, but they were in a school. He settled for putting his head in his hands and wishing his headache away.  
"Logan?" A voice asked questioningly. "Are you all right?" Logan looked up to see a beautiful white-haired African woman looking down at him. She had light brown skin and beautiful eyes. Next to Rogue and the professor, she was the most tolerant of him. He couldn't remember a time when anyone was ever really nice to him. She was nice though, but she also knew how to take charge of situation if it called for it.  
"I'm fine Storm." As her name suggested, she was able to manipulate the weather. It was a potent ability. "I just have a headache, did you need something?"  
"No, I was working with the professor and he said you might want to speak with him and that I might find you here. He's in his office."  
"Okay, thanks." Logan pushed off from the table and made his way to the professor's office. He didn't like this silence. He didn't trust it. He was about to knock on the door when a voice from within his own head said, "Come in Logan." _Show off_. Logan thought. "I heard that." came the voice inside his head again. Logan just smirked. Professor Charles Xaivier could read minds, communicate with people through thought. He'd also been known to freeze time. Logan began poking around the books. He wasn't seeing them though. He'd known someone else who could read minds. _Jean_. She was gone now, so it didn't matter. Besides, in the end, she hadn't wanted him. He resisted the urge to pick up the bookcase and throw it across the room.  
"You should go." Came the professor's calm and collected voice from behind the desk. Logan sat down. He really was tired.  
"Go where? Did I do something wrong? Are you mad at me?" Logan wondered when he'd begun to care about what this man thought of him.  
"I'm not kicking you out Logan, simply telling you to find the house."  
"You invaded my dreams?" Logan wasn't too upset yet, the professor had great respect for people's privacy that had only been enhanced by his gift, but he knew when to stick his nose into matters.  
"Not on purpose. Someone was projecting onto you, the power of it sucked me into the dream as well. Someone was sending you a message."  
"You mean those aren't my memories?" Logan paused. He didn't know why he wanted to remember about his past so much. Something seemed to tell him that it was important that he remember though, so he was constantly searching.  
"Perhaps. To be honest, I'm not sure what that was. Storm is preparing the jet, and Nightcrawler will accompany both of you. Don't argue, it's too far for you to ride your motorcycle and I need you all back here as quickly as possible. Plus, with the world the way it is right now, I don't want any of you out there alone. Summer break is about to begin, so enjoy the excursion while you can." For once Logan decided to do something smart. He gave in.  
"All right."  
"Don't worry, they know how much this means to you and they will not get in the way and they've promised not to bother you. Oh and try to be nice to Kurt, he's having a hard time."  
"I'm always nice." Logan couldn't help but quip as he went off to pack his bags and say goodbye to Rogue.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA(A/N: I can't get any symbols to load on here, but I need some way to seperate parts of a chapter so if you see a string of capital "A's" that's all that it means.)

"Bobby?" A young girl with reddish brown hair with one lone white streak poked her head inside his room. Her abnormally pale skin looked almost normal in the dim interior of the room. "Bobby, you awake?" Her voice still clung to her southern roots but at least her accent was not as thick as when she first arrived here. One of the beds was empty. The boy in the other one rolled over, mumbling something. When she made no response he sat up, put on his thick glasses so he could see and said, "He's not here."  
"Well, do you know where he went?"  
"I dunno." The boy said as he proceeded to get out of bed sighing. Rogue walked out the door. Storm was walking down the hall when Rogue greeted her.  
"Storm have you seen Bobby? I can't find him."  
"Rogue, didn't he tell you? His parents called. They wanted to try and work some things out this summer. He left late last night." Rogue was both perplexed and worried; it showed on her face. "C'mon, don't look like that and don't worry. Bobby had Scott come with him, at least until he knew his parents weren't going to do anything drastic." Rogue let out a breath that she was unaware she was holding.  
"I just wish he would have told me." Rogue headed towards her room where she sat on her bed clutching her pillow. She had met Bobby's parents only once before, right after the school had been invaded. It had been the closest place for them to stay. Bobby had finally told his parents what he was, and they'd reacted as expected, but then the cops came. Bobby's brother had called the cops on them. It was something that still bothered Bobby a lot. It hadn't helped that John had attacked the cops with his ability to manipulate fire. John. She was worried about him too. She had thought that they were friends, but when they fought at the lake to safe the professor, he'd just walked out on all of them. They had no idea where he had gone. If the professor knew where he was, he wasn't telling.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA  
  
Storm headed down by elevator to where the jet was deep underneath the school. She wasn't paying much attention, and she almost ran into a very strange looking creature. It was hard to tell how tall he was because he had the tendency to hunch down, whether from years of abuse due to his looks or because his joints just worked that way she wasn't sure. She felt it was probably some of both. He looked demonic with his blue skin, self- inflicted symbols carved into it, and his bright yellow eyes. He had three fingers on each hand and three toes on each foot. Plus, he had a tail; not one of the more inconspicuous mutants they had on board. However, she'd gotten use to how he looked quickly. She didn't have time to be scared of every little monstrosity that Mother Nature decided to send their way.  
"Oh, hallo. I vas just coming to speak wit you." Oh yeah, he also hailed from Germany.  
"Is there something wrong, Kurt?"  
"No, I vas just going to let you know that de jet is ready."  
"All right, thank you Kurt. You go tell the professor and I'll go track down Logan."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Logan had his sack thrown over his shoulder and knocked on Rogue's door. He didn't get a response so he peeked in to see if she was there. She was sitting there, but her mind was miles away. "Hey." He said. She jumped. "Sorry, but I don't think there was any other way of doing that without scaring you." She noticed his sack on the floor as he pulled out her desk chair and sat in it, backwards, so he could prop his arms on the back.  
"You leaving again?" She asked.  
"Yeah. I may have another lead on a memory."  
"That doesn't make me feel better, look what happened last time you got a lead on a memory." Logan winced mentally. He still felt bad about everything that happened at the lake.  
"Don't go." It was too much like what the girl from the dream had said. It startled him and he asked, "What did you say?"  
"I didn't say anything. You all right, maybe you shouldn't go." Logan shook his head. His headache was back.  
"Logan?" Storm joined the party.  
"I'm ready to go, just saying goodbye."  
"All right, well you can head down to the jet. Kurt should be down there. I'll be down after I talk to the professor." Logan nodded. Something about this trip made him nervous. No it scared him.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA  
  
Bobby and Scott had ridden the whole way mostly in silence. Bobby was nervous to be going home, something he thought he'd never feel. He doubted his family and that made him angry and sad. In his one true moment of need they'd failed him. It wasn't necessarily their fault the circumstances were bad. At least, that's what he kept telling himself. Scott pulled into Bobby's driveway, turned off the motor and looked at him. Scott was a handsome man with chiseled features and short brown hair. He wore red tinted sunglasses all of the time, otherwise, he'd fry you with energy beams that shot from his eyes. No joke. Next to Scott, Bobby looked very different. He had spiky blond hair and ice blue eyes. That was funny, that his eyes would be described that way, because ice was his specialty. He could produce and manipulate ice just by thinking about it, but he usually needed a focus like using his hands. He was wearing everyday clothes of khakis and a blue T-shirt. Scott was wearing black jeans, a black T-shirt, and a leather jacket. It really was too hot for leather, but Bobby wasn't going to say anything.  
He and Scott looked at each other across the top of the car as they got out. "Ready?" Scott asked. Bobby nodded and they proceeded up the walkway to the front door. Bobby hesitantly knocked something he wouldn't have normally done. After several seconds of no answer, Bobby rang the doorbell.  
"That's odd." Bobby said.  
"What is?" Asked Scott.  
"Well, it's just, they knew that I was going to be here. I mean they're the ones that called me. I called earlier at the last rest stop and they said they'd be here. I wonder what's going on?"  
"I don't like this, something's wrong. Bobby get back in the car. I'm going to check this out."  
"They're my family, I want to make sure they're okay."  
"For once, don't argue with me, get back in the car and stay there." Scott proceeded to open the door.

A/N: If anyone can tell me some better way to split up my sections, I'd be grateful.


	3. Old Acquaintances

Chapter 3: Old Acquaintances  
  
Scott opened the door cautiously staying near the frame just in case. The door had been left ajar as though someone had come or gone quickly, the door being the least of their worries. When nothing popped out to kill him he proceeded into the living room. He stopped short. This was bad.  
  
000000000  
  
Logan fixed his shoulder strap for what had to have been the six- hundredth time.  
"Gee Logan, I've never seen you fidget before." Storm said grinning, though deep down she was nervous. If Logan was nervous, she should definitely be nervous.  
"I'm not fidgeting." After a short pause just in case she didn't believe him, "I'm not."  
"Whatever you say. We're almost there. I have to find a place to land."  
"So, where is this house anyway?" Logan felt very stupid. He should know where they were going. He'd just been having a hard time paying attention.  
"The house is actually in Toronto, on one of the islands near there. We'll have to go into town and take a ferry." Logan went very still. He didn't like water, and the mention of it had made him nervous. The only problem was, he couldn't figure out why.  
  
000000000  
  
Bobby stared at the interior of his house. He was trying to make sense of it all, he really was. The only problem was that none of it made any sense. The whole house was empty. Everything and everyone was gone. On top of that portions of the house were burned away, scorched and blackened with soot. Bobby couldn't help but wonder if John had been here, then couldn't figure out a reason why John would have been here. Bobby felt slightly guilty about that thought, however, John had always made a big display of being able to manipulate fire. As far as Bobby knew, John could at least tolerate him, though neither would call the other true friend. For Bobby, John was too much of a wildcard to be trusted. For John, it was because he thought Bobby was a wuss.  
"There's no one here, there hasn't been anyone here for a long time." Scott said into the prevailing silence. "Are you sure that whoever called was really your parents?" Bobby just shook his head. He wasn't sure of anything anymore.  
  
000000000  
  
They were finally here. So why did Logan want to turn around and walk away? He wasn't sure he just knew that something bad was going to happen. He looked back to the gate. Storm was standing patiently. Kurt was crouched in a tree constantly scanning in case he had to tele-port or hide. That was Kurt's ability. He could transport himself anywhere that he'd seen, as long as he was within a reasonable distance. When he "bampfed" as the kids at the Institute affectionately called it for that was the sound his disappearance made, he left behind a cloud of sulfur gas that was also present when he reappeared. The professor had been greatly intrigued by this ability and was trying to convince Kurt to let him probe further into the matter.  
Logan looked back at the house. It was the same house from his dream only slightly more rundown. Pieces of siding had come off leaving patches like scabs. The grass had grown to almost knee height and some kind of vine looked to take over the porch roof. The car that had once leaned drunkenly alongside the house now was reduced to a pile of rust, no longer distinguishable even by Logan who had known it was a car. The porch was sagging and he almost fell through the second step. All of the windows were either boarded up, dirt covered black, or missing all together. The door hung crookedly on its hinges, and when Logan went to open it, it fell forward with a thunderous crash. Logan looked back and waved at Storm who had started forward at the sound. He waved away the thick cloud of dust that had dutifully risen to action after being disturbed.  
He took a cautious step forward and was standing in the long, dark hall that had only one door to it. If he had been thinking logically he would have realized that was impossible. If the first thing you came to was the hallway than the outer dimensions didn't fit the inner dimensions. However, he wasn't thinking logically and after a couple of seconds he wouldn't be thinking at all because in the next instant, the floor gave out underneath Logan and he fell letting out a startled yell.  
  
000000000  
  
Storm was worried. Logan had been inside the house for a very long time. She squinted worriedly up at the house and sighed. She resisted the urge to start pacing.  
"Maybe ve should go and check on him?" Kurt asked both reproachfully and hopefully. He didn't like being out in the open this long. Logan had been gone a long time, but still Kurt did not wish to anger him.  
"Kurt you read my mind." Storm said as she started up the drive.  
  
000000000  
  
_"Don't go through the door at the end of the hall. Bad things happen in there."_ The voice whispered across his semi-conscious state. Logan had a watery image of what he thought was the girl from his dream when pain jerked him back to reality.  
Logan groaned and sat up. After several seconds he could see clearly. There were times he didn't like being able to heal quickly, no wait, he must have hit his head harder than he thought, because that was a lie. He cracked his neck and stood up. He was in a room bare save for its white motif that included the table and chairs. _Wait, table? Chairs?_ He thought. There was a man there, sitting so Logan wasn't sure as to how tall or bulky he was. He was hard to see in the shadows, but Logan could at least tell that he was wearing a large black trench coat. Once he was paying attention to detail, he also noticed a woman beside him.  
She was short and blonde and wore glasses. She was also wearing what appeared to be a lab coat. In fact, if it weren't for the fact that she was short and blonde, she would have reminded him of Jean when they first met. "Hello Logan," the man spoke, "please have a seat." Logan looked at the man, looked at the chair and then the woman and said, "How about you tell me what's going on, and I'll decide if I want to sit or not then."  
"Fair enough." The girl looked away, her expression unreadable.  
"Start talkin' bub." Logan was edgy, like he knew he really wasn't going to like what he was about to hear. The something dawned on him.  
"We're not in the house anymore are we?" The man just shook is head agreeing that they weren't. "Than where the hell are we?" "Someplace secret, safe." The man replied. "Did you send me that dream, tell me to come here?" "No, you decided that for yourself, I merely made a suggestion." "You seem familiar, do I know you? Wait I do." From the depths of Logan's memory a name floated and attached to the face. "You're Fury, Nick Fury. You work for SHIELD." Logan couldn't really remember what SHIELD did, but then he wasn't really sure that SHIELD knew what SHIELD did.  
  
(A/N: Two things to apologize for, the first the awful James Bond naming stunt I pulled above and the second being me copping out on the SHIELD thing. I am having a hard time finding out what they do in my research so if anyone knows, please tell me.)  
  
"I'm head of shield now, glad to see you haven't forgotten everything."  
"I'm just full of surprises."  
"As I recall, you don't like surprises." Fury said. Logan shrugged.  
"There's no easy way to tell you this, but I suppose I should let Caroline tell you. Caroline..." Logan turned his sardonic gaze on her. She looked away.  
"Weapon X, I never thou—" She broke off when he glared at her.  
"It's Logan."  
  
(A/N: Yeah, here's where it gets tricky...In the cartoon he knows a lot more about the Weapon X project than he does in the movie, shrugs my story, mostly my rules.)  
  
"Ri--right." She stuttered. Now she was nervous. "After the Weapon X project was disbanded, a new group, HYDRA took over their research." She glanced at him uneasily at the mention of Weapon X, but afterwards she gained confidence in what she said. "HYDRA had a plan to create the perfect weapon, going beyond where they had failed with you. They quickly realized that to do this, the weapon would need your rejuvenating powers. So they took samples of DNA and created several specimens." She paused when he held up a hand.  
"Are you trying to tell me that you CLONED me?!"  
"Um...well no. See if it was a clone, the specimen would be male and look exactly like you, but as is the case the specimen is female and only looks slightly like you. She was created as I said to be the most advanced weapon that the world had ever seen. When she was twelve she underwent the Weapon X treatment." Caroline was cut off by Logan lunging out of his chair and smacking the table very hard. He didn't remember much about having his skin ripped open and hot metal grafted to his skeleton but he knew one thing for sure: those memories should not be in a little girl's head. "YOU DID THAT TO A TWELVE YEAR OLD!" He roared. His vision was taking on a dangerous hue of scarlet. He wanted to pick up the table and hurl it at Caroline's head. He decided that he really didn't like her much. "What went wrong? If she's anything like me, something had to have gone wrong."  
"The girl, X23, she was her own undoing, she was too good, too destructive."  
"You couldn't handle her." Logan snorted in disgust.  
"Watch." Caroline said as she flipped on a screen behind her and footage of what Logan could only assume to be X23 flickered to life.  
On the black and white screen a young girl with medium long brown hair and pale skin dressed in a black workout suit worked her way through an obstacle course. She hacked and slashed, jumped, dodged, and whirled until she collapsed from exhaustion. Then the scene changed and the same girl appeared only older and in white. A guard accompanied her to what he could only conclude was a park. A young blond pigtailed girl walked over to X23 and offered her a doll in the hopes that they might play together. X23 shoved the girl aside and ripped the head off of the doll. Logan wasn't sure which look in X23's eyes was more heartbreaking: the unrestrained rage she showed when ripping off the doll's head, or the unfeeling coldness that settled in after the deed was done as she was dragged away by her keeper.  
"X23 escaped when she was about 16, about two years after this footage. We had been unable to track her activities until now." Caroline spoke softly into the silence. "I loved her. I tried to protect her the best that I could, but by the time..." She trailed off. "Bring her back to me, please."  
"Lady, with friends like you, enemies are not needed." Logan said bitterly.  
"There's more." Fury said as Caroline quietly began to cry. "Follow me."  
He walked out a door that Logan hadn't noticed before. Logan seemed to have no choice but to follow. They walked out into a hallway that had many doors and went through the door that had been splintered as though someone had smacked into it, hard. Logan followed Fury further down to another doorway that was actually devoid of a door. The interior of the room was trashed. Claw marks marred the walls and the computer that had once occupied the desk was demolished. He still wasn't understanding why he was here and was about to voice his inquiry when Fury handed him a printout.  
"We uploaded the last thing that she was looking at when she went nuts." Logan stared at his own image glowering back at him. "She's coming for you."  
"What do you want me to do?"  
"Find her, catch her, convince her, whatever, but bring her back to me."  
  
000000000  
  
Logan opened groggy eyes for the second time that day. He looked up into Storm and Kurt's worried eyes. He groaned and sat up, cracking his neck as he went. "I wish you wouldn't do that." Storm said. Logan wasn't listening though. He was back at the house, on the floor; no holes, a long hallway, but no door at the end. He wondered if he had dreamed the whole thing when he realized that he had something crumpled in his hand. It was a blank white card with a phone number. "We gotta get back to the Institute." 


	4. Fair Warning

Chapter 4: Fair Warning  
  
Scott and Bobby were driving on the highway. They had been riding in silence. Bobby felt very alone and lost even though Scott was sitting right next to him. Bobby suddenly felt panicked, something was wrong. Something was wrong with the darkness.  
"Look out!" Bobby yelled and Scott steered hard off of the road. For one instance as the high beams slashed across the roadway, Bobby swore he saw a pale girl with long black hair and wearing a white dress standing in the middle of the road. The car slammed into a tree nearly ripping in half. When the dust had settled, neither of the occupants moved.

* * *

Logan, Storm, and Kurt were very nervous as they road the elevator up by the professor's office. Storm and Kurt were only worried because they knew that Logan was worried. When the elevator doors opened, they were nearly run over by a flood of students scrambling to make it to their last day of class on time. The trio let out a huge sigh of relief and headed towards the office. As they walked down the hall, the power went out and the Institute was encased in darkness.  
"What's going on?" Storm asked a little panicked. She was claustrophobic, so the darkness made her uneasy. She was working very hard to keep her erratic heartbeat under control.  
"Quiet!" Logan snapped. He heard something. A scratching sound, tow surfaces being scraped together, one sharper than the other, was coming from near the stairs at the front of the house. He cautiously started in that direction and then broke out into a run. He was standing at the top of the stairs and he wished the day wasn't so overcast, he hated when he couldn't see. He heard a rustling coming from the bottom of the stairs. Logan started down them when the lights coming back on blinded him. Behind him the professor, Kurt, Storm, and several students had gathered on the landing. Someone gasped. Logan looked up. On the wall, two feet above the door, a message was scrawled:  
FAIR WARNING  
  
X23 was crouched in a tree outside the Institute's gate. She had initially been very angry because Logan was not where he was supposed to be. It was probably good that she had only been angry about that because she never calmed down enough to realize that there were too many people around. She really hadn't thought this plan out. So, she decided to buy some time and send Logan a message while she was inside. She jumped down from the tree and headed down the road. She'd need at least a week to case the place.

* * *

Bobby awoke to silence. At first he thought he could no longer see, that the crash may have done something to his eyes, but then reality checked in and he realized that it was just dark. He slowly sat up, rubbing the back of his head as he did. He looked around for Scott and discovered that he was in a room of a house. Something was wrong with the house though, like whoever had helped them only wanted them to think it was a house. He tried to stand but thought better of it when the room started to tilt and whirl. After he could see clearly he tried to stand again and found that he could with a little help from the headboard.  
He needed to find Scott. If whoever had taken them in was like anyone else, they would have taken Scott's glasses off. If Scott were coming around too, they would be in for a lot of trouble. He opened the door and found that there were five doors to get through, and that was just on this level if the stairs at the end of the hall were any indication. Bobby decided to start with the room next to his, but no one was there. The same result showed up in the next four rooms as well. So, Bobby did the next systematic and logical thing. He headed downstairs. The first room he came to looked like a living room, but again there was something off about it. Just as he thought he could place what was so eerie about the rooms, he heard a noise. He hoped he wasn't too late and took off in the direction of the commotion.

* * *

Scott had awakened, mentally that is. Since the last thing he remembered was crashing, he knew it would be a pretty good idea not to open his eyes. The fact that no one had tried to pry them open after the crash was short of miraculous. He heard someone come in and tried to look as unconscious as he could, but something must have given him away because the person spoke to him.  
"Nice to see you awake. We were beginning to think you'd taken off for good." It was a woman's voice, a down to business voice, a pleasant insanity voice. "I'm just going to check some things, make sure you don't have a concussion." To Scott's horror he felt her hands on his forehead. She was going to make Scott open his eyes. It was normal procedure, but Scott was normal. He panicked and rolled off of whatever he was lying on. The woman gasped, mumbling something. She must have bent to help him up, but Scott couldn't keep his eyes squeezed shut any longer. He managed to grit out a tight, "Duck." before he opened his eyes. .

* * *

Bobby was nearly hit on the side by Scott's beam. At the last second he dodged to the left. He looked around the corner to see Scott kneeling on the floor, a woman was near Scott but Bobby couldn't tell if she was hurt or not. On the table next to Scott's bed were Scott's glasses, which had somehow survived the crash undamaged.  
"Hang on Scott. It's Bobby. I'm going to get your glasses but you have to close your eyes so that I can get to them."  
"I'm trying." Scott replied. It was a lot harder than Bobby thought for the amount of effort it was taking Scott just to close his eyes. Suddenly the red beam stopped and Bobby ran for the bed.  
"Talk about your wake up call." Bobby tried to lighten the situation some. He didn't think that Scott got it or he just didn't find it all that funny. He handed the glasses to Scott and turned toward the woman on the floor. She was lying face first and it looked as though she had been hit on the shoulder by Scott's beam. Scott propped himself up on the bed.  
"Is she all right?"  
"I think so." Bobby replied. "I think you just stunned her." She let out a low moan and slowly pushed herself up until she was able to kneel.  
"What was that?" She asked. She managed to stand and looked at Scott. Scott was staring down at his hands. The woman took in Bobby for the first time. "Normally I'd yell at you for being out of bed already after a crash like that, but I don't think I would have ever figured out to hand him his glasses either." She noticed that Bobby looked a little confused. "Oh sorry, I'm Irene Baker. I'm a doctor who happened to be close when you swerved. Since the nearest facility is in the next county over, I had you brought here. Neither of you were injured enough to send you to a real facility." She said anticipating the next question that Scott was about to ask. "Now I'm really glad about that decision. If the doctors had been treated to that kind of display you'd be on your way to God knows where. You're mutants aren't you?"  
"Unless you know of anyone else who can shoot energy beams out of their eyes, than yeah I am a mutant, but Bobby here isn't." Bobby just nodded at Scott. No sense having them both branded in case being a mutant was a bad thing, which it usually was.  
"Oh well, I'll have to ask both you boys to get some rest. You both hit your heads pretty hard." Irene forcefully led Bobby out of the room and back to his own. Bobby eventually began to feel very sleepy, but something was still bothering him. Just as he was on the brink of sleep it hit him. The house had absolutely no windows in it. As soon as his mind registered this he swore he heard a lock clicking into place and the darkness sucked him down.

* * *

_Don't leave me._ The girl was back again.  
_What do you want me to do?  
_ _Come find me._ The girl replied. It bothered him that he still couldn't see her face  
_Tell me where you are_. It felt as though he'd already had this conversation.  
_I can't remember. Help me!  
_  
_I'm sorry...  
_  
_Logan! Don't leave me, I'm scared. Logan!  
_ Logan awoke to the sound of someone screaming his name. He looked around but couldn't see anyone.  
"I'm over here." Rogue's voice was calm but underneath she was scared.  
"What are you doing over in the corner?"  
"You were having a nightmare. Remember what happened last time I tried to wake you up from a nightmare?" Logan winced. One of the first couple of nights at the Institute he'd had a dream or a memory. When Rogue had tried to wake him up, he'd ended up stabbing her with his claws. It had been an accident, but if Rogue hadn't possessed the ability to absorb a mutant's power she would have been dead. She had absorbed his ability to heal and had nearly put him in a coma.  
"Sorry." Just for good measure he looked down to make sure that his claws weren't extended. Rogue walked over to him.  
"You all right? You were murmuring something."  
"Yeah, like you said, just a nightmare."  
"Also, the professor wants to see you."  
"What time is it? Never mind, I'm probably better off not knowing." Logan headed towards the professor's office.  
"No, they're down in the lab." Rogue called over her shoulder as she seemingly headed back to bed. He turned around and made his way down there.  
"Logan, glad you could join us. There are several matters that need to be discussed. First of all, Scott has not checked in with me. I can't find him or Bobby for that matter. In fact, Bobby's home number has been disconnected. I'm worried. Storm, I want you and Nightcrawler to check it out and report back as soon as possible." Storm and Kurt nodded.  
"You should let Rogue go with them." Logan added.  
"Why do you propose that."  
"Cuz I'm gonna go with them no matter what you say." Rogue's voice came from the corner. Storm and Kurt jumped, but Logan and the professor had already known that she was there.  
"Very well Rogue, at least this way someone will be looking out for you I suppose you may go with Storm and Kurt." Storm, Kurt, and Rogue had a short discussion and then the three of them left.  
"Logan, I'm curious as to what happened in the house earlier, but even more puzzling is the message left on our wall. Did you know that whatever carved that message seems to be fairly consistent with your own claws?"  
"Do you actually have to ask that question?" Logan was fighting desperately to keep his mind blank. This was one thing the professor didn't need to worry about.  
"Fair enough, what's going on? You looked pretty perplexed when the lights came back on."  
"I couldn't smell anyone there." The professor just looked at him. "Look I could hear someone scratching that message into the wall. I could even feel them moving, but most of how I sense people is by smell, and whoever was there, didn't have a scent."  
"Like a phantom, or a ghost." The professor added. Logan stared at the table. He'd had enough ghosts for one night. "Well, I suppose you should go back and get as much sleep as you can. It's going to be just me and you left to hold down the fort while everyone else is gone. The children are going to be quite a handful now that school's out." Logan cringed. He almost wished he'd go back to having that creepy nightmare. 


	5. Reunion

Chapter 5: Reunion  
  
X23 had noticed the activity of the mansion. The white-haired woman had left with someone in a large hooded cloak and a girl. Several students had also left early in the morning to return home for the summer. From her perch in the tree by the main gate she focused on the house making sure the front was clear. She wouldn't have any problems with the front of the house. She hopped onto the wall that ran around the school and quickly scurried into a tree near the back of the house where children of all ages ran around playing in the expansive backyard. They were all mutants and at least amongst themselves they did not mind being such.  
She waited in the tree and eventually around noon a very bald man in a wheel chair ushered the children inside. At one point, X23 thought that the man was looking directly at her, but then he shook his head as though puzzled and went inside. She reflected back on her own training sessions. The countless lessons, the exhaustion in the pain, just because she healed rapidly, didn't mean that the wounds didn't hurt. Sometimes she would collapse, and then they would beat her trying to get her to cooperate, but usually by that time she was thousands of miles away. She did not comprehend what it meant to play. She did not understand what fun was, at least not in a way anyone else would. Some emotion she could not explain welled up inside her, a feeling of deep loss. Something was running down her face and she hastily reached up to wipe away the unexpected and alien tear.  
_Why are you acting like this? You know what you came here to do, so do it.  
But...  
No, no buts. Now move._ Obeying the more commanding side of her ego she got down out of the tree and headed towards the house.

* * *

Rouge was in the back seat, fidgeting. She didn't really understand what was happening. Bobby's parents were pretty rational. She'd remembered his mom being somewhat opened minded about her son's gifts. They hadn't really picked the best time to divulge to his parents that he wasn't at some prep school like they had thought for all those years. Then John had to go crazy and all the cops showing up, wasn't exactly the best way to make a pro-mutant statement for them. Thinking about it she felt that Bobby's parents deserved to hear the truth under better circumstances, fewer cops this time. Now she was depressing herself. She just wanted to find Bobby, see for herself that he was okay. She'd worry about everything else later.  
Storm pulled the car into Bobby's driveway. The yard looked pretty good for having almost completely been incinerated. Storm turned around and looked at Rogue.  
"You ready?" She asked. Rogue nodded and looked questioningly at Kurt. Storm answered her unspoken question. "Kurt you stay in the car. If anyone comes, call me and let me know." Kurt nodded or at least Storm thought he nodded. His hood was very deep and as such none of his face could be seen. Rogue and Storm got out of the car and headed up the drive. Storm looked at Rogue when they reached the door, and Rogue knocked. After a couple seconds of silence Rogue tried the doorbell. The door swung open and Bobby's mom gaped at them speechless. Recovering herself she ushered them in.  
"I'm sorry, I was just about to call you. Isn't Bobby coming down? You are one of his –er teachers right?" Storm and Rogue looked at each other.  
"Yes, I teach at the Institute, but I don't understand. Bobby was sent down here with another instructor, Scott Summers, to meet with you. We haven't heard from them since they left and we got a little worried." Storm explained. Bobby's mom looked puzzled.  
"Well we were out for awhile last night, but other than that we were home for most of the evening. Bobby and his teacher never arrived." Rogue got up from the couch that she and Storm had been sitting on and went over to the window, trying not to cry.  
Bobby where are you?

* * *

Kurt was doing as he was told. He didn't understand why he kept being sent out on these missions. He didn't do well in crowds and he had actually been doing his best to avoid them. He just wanted to be left alone for awhile, but he'd do what he was told for now. He was staring straight ahead, but something was tickling at the back of his mind. Something or someone didn't want him to look to the left, he found, because try as he might he could not turn his head to the left. He reached down for the cell phone but found he could not dial the number for the phone that Storm carried. Kurt was trying to figure out what to do but something was keeping his mind focused on what was straight ahead.

* * *

Bobby couldn't open his eyes. He'd tried, his mind had screamed at them for over an hour to open, but apparently his brain waves weren't intimidating enough. So he lay still and he listened. Two voices, one male and raspy, the other was the voice of the woman who'd found them after the crash.  
"What happened?"  
"The anesthesia wore off before it was supposed to. The boy went walking around out of his room. Someone left the door unlocked." This said by the woman in an accusatory tone.  
"And the other?" The male voice asked.  
"His ability is not one which is easily controlled. I had first hand witnessing of it."  
"Yes, it's a shame he didn't kill you." The male voice said something else, but Bobby was fading fast. He felt like he was waiting for something, looking for some clue.  
"There is no room for error, no more errors from either of you. Keep them unconscious until the proper time. Keep them separated." A third voice joined the conversation. Bobby felt that he was listening to something that was incredibly important, but at that moment a new wave of lethargy coursed through him and he once again fell asleep.

* * *

X23 was sitting on the roof. The rain poured in a curtain around her so that her visibility was limited. She had been drenched an hour ago, but she couldn't let small discomforts bother her. She crept to a window that led down into the school. She had work to do.

* * *

The whole issue of there being someone else out there who shared his DNA was bothering Logan. He wasn't sure how he should feel about it, or how he should view himself in relation to her, which was bothering him most of all. This was essentially his kid and she was trying to kill him. _Talk about your dysfunctional family_. Logan quipped to himself. He flopped down onto his bed and stared at the ceiling. He was tired. He didn't want to think about this anymore.

* * *

X23 had put most of the children easily out of commission and had wandered into the library. She heard that same annoying voice from the past. This time it came from when she'd been caught with a book on Greek mythology.  
_Why would you want to fill your head with such utter nonsense? What good will fairy tales do you? There is no such thing as "happily ever after" so why would you even want to delude yourself into thinking that there was?  
_ She quickly slammed the door to wherever that voice had snuck out from. However, the damage had already been done. She collapsed down on the nearby table and cried.

* * *

The professor couldn't sleep. It seemed it was an elusive activity in this household. A nagging sensation had been bothering him since this afternoon. It felt like there was another mind present in the mansion, but he could feel no stranger anywhere. He got up and headed down the hall. He could only hear silence from the rooms and the sound of rain on the roof. Then he heard something out of place. Someone was sobbing in the library. He wheeled himself in and saw someone flung on a table in the shadows. The mind felt vaguely alien and yet...  
"Logan?" The professor asked worriedly. With an angry gasp of shock, the shadow loomed up and the professor was down for the count.

* * *

She was angry now. She was angry with herself for getting upset. She was angry because she'd been caught and crying no less! She was angry because she couldn't understand why she was upset. She was angry and embarrassed, a dangerous combination. As far as she knew, no one else was in the house, but she'd make a second sweep just to be sure.

* * *

Once again, Logan couldn't sleep. Sighing he got up and figured he'd go down to the kitchen and get something to drink. It wouldn't be beer, true, but he could pretend. He was walking past the library when he noticed the door ajar and a light on.  
"Hello, anyone in here?" Logan looked in and was about to turn the lights out and leave when he noticed a chair overturned towards the back. As he got closer he realized that it was the professor's wheelchair.  
He got to the professor and turned him over. He was obviously unconscious, but not by ordinary means. There was an odd semi-flat disc in the center of the professor's forehead. There seemed to be a slight impression in the center of the circle. The disc was definitely attached to the skin and when Logan tried to touch it he got a nasty shock. He wasn't sure if the shock he'd been delivered had also gone through the professor, so for the time being he thought it would be safer if he left it alone. He was fairly certain this was X23's handiwork, but he couldn't figure out how she'd tricked the professor. He continued downstairs until he was in the main foyer of the Institute.  
In a flash of lightening she was there. At first, he thought it was the girl from his dreams again, but the shadow was crouched and stood up in degrees as he slowly circled it. A puddle had gathered underneath her. She must have just come in out of the rain. She had long hair that looked black right now since it was dripping wet. Logan couldn't see her face. He was about to say something when her fist connected solidly with his face.

* * *

Okay, so she had sucker-punched him, but if he had circled her one more time she would have ripped his spine out. She moved away quickly and blended into the shadows due to her ebony ensemble. She had a specially made black jumpsuit made of a stretchy but durable material. Kind of like what you'd find in a swimsuit, only thicker. It was very form fitting. She had on her black ankle length combat boots and her finger-less gloves to complete the look. She had to admit, she looked pretty damn cool, but right now she didn't care about how she looked. She was beyond pissed off, she was in a rage. She had to remind herself that she didn't want him dead right away.  
"No, you have to suffer first." She hadn't realized that she'd spoken aloud because Logan looked up at her in awe.  
"Get up!" She screamed as she kicked him in the stomach dangerously close to his crotch. Logan scrunched up trying to prevent as small of a target as possible. X23 wasn't happy with that so she kicked him in the back causing him to arch with the pain. Logan scrambled waiting for his broken nose to heal so that he might be able to breathe. Suddenly she was just there and she slammed him into the wall.  
"For someone who was trained in the government, your fighting skills suck." She said as she slammed his head into another wall. Logan just kind of slumped there.

* * *

Logan was getting pretty tired of being a piñata so after the last hit he decided to lie there and lure her into to doing something stupid. She came at him again, only this time he wasn't about to take another beating. One had been enough for him. He extended his claws and stabbed into her foot with one hand and slashed across her knees with the other. She was taken by surprise and collapsed to the floor giving him enough time to stand up. She got back up too fast for him though and delivered a powerful roundhouse kick, pummeling his face. He fell backwards. Once again she ran at him so he tucked up his legs and then thrust them into her stomach as she launched herself at him and threw her over his head and into something. He thought it might be the coffee table, but he didn't really have time to check right now. He got back to his feet just as she was regaining hers. Logan knew he had to take her down now, he had to stop her. He did the only thing he could think of, he charged her. HE took her by surprise, like he'd hoped, only he had misjudged where they were standing. The force of his impact with her propelled them both out of the window and into the night.

* * *

She hit the ground hard and covered her eyes to prevent the shower of glass from gouging them. He'd surprised her with those last moves because he hadn't been thinking when he'd done them. It threw off her perception of them. She was getting to her feet when something slammed into her shoulder blades forcing her body to the ground and pinning it immobile.  
"Now you stay down!" Logan yelled at her. She just growled at him. She wiggled around and when she was in a better position she side swiped his legs from underneath him.  
"Look I don't want to hurt you." Logan growled at her.  
"That's too bad, because I really want to hurt you." She snarled at him.

* * *

He just stared up at her. _Was I this angry too, years ago after I escaped?_ He decided he'd try and reason with her, but first she'd have to calm down. She ran at him again and he threw her into the fountain in the driveway where they had landed. She extended a claw from her foot, dug it into the stone and pivoted on it so that when she retracted it she landed on her feet. Then she extended her claws, two in each hand and waited for the next move. Logan just stared at her. He hadn't really wanted to believe that it was true, but now he had no choice. He extended his claws but only to defend from her own. He was determined not to hurt her. He didn't think that hurting her would help much. The sparred their way across the lawn.  
"Listen to me! I understand what they did to you. I know what it's like! I know those people should burn in hell, but you coming after me isn't going to accomplish anything." Logan was barely keeping her at arms length.  
"You're the reason they did this to me!" She screamed at him.  
"It was not my fault they did this to you, you know that. If I'd have known—"  
"You'd have done what? Stopped them?" She turned away and broke out in hysterical laughter that quickly broke down into sobs. She collapsed to the ground and cried. He heard a sound off in the distance, the rotary noise of helicopters.  
"Look, I'm supposed to hand you over to some people that are looking for you." She looked up wildly at that and then prepared herself for battle once more.  
"You son of a bitch, you set me up!"  
"Now hang on! Would you listen for one god damn minute! I am not handing you over." With that he shoved her backwards.  
"Go, get out of her." She looked at him blindly. She was very confused. "Do I have to shove you again? Go!" She turned around and ran. Just as she made it out of sight, the helicopters came into view.  
Soldiers streamed out and invaded the school.  
"Where is she Logan?" Fury's voice cut into the cold, wet air. Logan had forgot it was raining. He was soaked through.  
"She got away." They had a brief staring contest and then Fury turned away barking orders.  
"Oh by the way, just press the impressions if you want to get those discs off of your friend's heads." Logan sighed, he'd have a lot of explaining to do and as he looked around the yard, a lot of repair work as well. Maybe he could leave them all unconscious for just a little while longer...

* * *

Rogue was staring out of the window when she interrupted Storm and Bobby's mom's conversation.  
"Wait you said you were goin' to call us, but the professor said your phone's been disconnected. What's really goin' on?" Bobby's mom just looked at her. The staring contest was interrupted by Kurt popping in.  
"Someting is vrong," he directed at Storm. "Somevone is here, outside." Storm got up and moved, then froze.  
"Storm, what's wrong?" Rogue asked.  
"I can't move." She said. "Kurt take Rogue and get out of here."  
"I can't." Kurt said.  
"I'm sorry." This came from Bobby's mom, only it wasn't her voice, someone else's voice was underneath it and it sounded very creepy. "I'm afraid you'll have to be detained." Rogue, Storm, and Kurt had the similar sensation of feeling like someone was pressing them down into the ground. Right before they felt as though their head would explode, they blacked out. 


	6. Flaunt It

Chapter 6: Flaunt It  
  
--6 Weeks Later--  
  
Logan and the professor had been stretched thin trying to take care of all the students over summer break and search for their missing friends at the same time. They couldn't track them and Logan was about to go crazy. He was headed toward the kitchen to see if he could kick students out and back to bed when the phone rang. After digging around the couch cushions he came up with the phone, $2.00 in change, and a lighter. He had to wonder about the last one but then he realized that he'd never answered the phone here before and he wasn't sure what to say. He decided on a gruff "Hello?"  
"Meet me at Pandora's Box tomorrow night at 11:30, don't be late." A clipped business like voice said over the phone. It sounded familiar but it was so late that Logan didn't even begin to care. He did one last sweep of the house, locked as many doors and windows that he knew about and went to talk to the professor.  
"It could be about our missing mutants." Logan said as he finished reporting the odd phone call. The professor was lost in thought and didn't seem to be paying much attention.  
"I think you should go and check it out, in the meantime, we've got some students who are attempting to go on a joy ride, why don't we take some of the joy out of it?" Logan grinned evilly. Right now, punishing the kids sounded like a lot of fun.

* * *

A young mutant named Roger and his gang of cronies had piled into one of the cars and was opening the garage door when the lights caught on someone silhouetted in the middle of the driveway. The group consisted of two other people, Alyssa and a guy known only as Golem. Roger and his gang were known to be bullies. Good. Logan thought to himself. This would be a lot more fun than he thought.

* * *

--The Next Night, Pandora's Box, 11:35 p.m.--  
  
Logan and the professor had decided it would be best if Logan went all by himself, after all someone had to watch the kids. Until he walked into the place, he hadn't realized that it was a strip club. Flashing lights and loud pounding music disoriented Logan. Pot smoke filled the air so thick you could probably get a high just standing there breathing. As soon as he walked in a young blonde, heavily made up, and no older than Rogue came up to him.  
"Follow me." She whispered in his ear. He was unsure as to what kind of invitation it was until he saw her nod to the bartender. Someone had responded to the signal the bartender gave. Logan caught a flash of long, straight black hair and pale skin. He decided he had no choice but to follow the blonde. Up ahead, the girl with the dark hair slid down one of the poles to the applause and catcalls of some of the patrons. He caught a glimpse of very spiky heels that seemed to stay attached by leather straps that came up underneath the brunette's knees. She also had on a simple, short black skirt. As for the top, you couldn't see it from behind if she was even wearing one because her hair covered her back. Then the girl up ahead disappeared and the blonde turned a corner.  
Logan found himself in a hallway made up completely of glass. Every window was full of gyrating, half-naked women and even some men. There were even people pressing themselves up against glass that made up the floor and ceiling. The hallway finally ended and surprisingly two women well-dressed in business suits opened very large double doors for his escort and him. The room seemed to be a large conference room area. One wall was nothing but window that let moonlight in. The girl he'd seen early stood looking out of them. As soon as they were alone the girl flipped all that hair over one shoulder. She was wearing a black backless halter top that was held on by very thin straps. At the small of her back was a black and red tatoo:  
2X3 (A/N: Obviously it would look a lot spiffier than that, I just wanted to give you a general idea.) She didn't hide her identity, she flaunted it.

* * *

Rogue was actually aware that she wasn't in control of her own thoughts. Her first instinct was to jerk away but when her body obeyed her mind was full of pain. Pieces of her life went floated before her like some kind of grotesque parade: The time when she first kissed a boy and nearly killed him, the bar where she'd run into Logan, her nearly being killed when Logan crashed the car, the Institute and her life there, being stabbed when she tried to wake Logan up, Magneto putting her in that machine of his...and so on. All of the images went flashing past one right after the other. As soon as the track came to the end, they'd start all over again. It was beginning to get on Rogue's nerves. So she tried to think of other things. She thought of the few times she'd kissed Bobby and just generally hanging out with her friends. Suddenly her mind broke free and she was left to her own devices. She almost wished she'd gone with the program because she was suddenly drowning in thick fluid that had the consistency of gel.

* * *

"You didn't just think I'd leave you alone did you?" She asked as she turned to face him. Unlike the women who worked outside her clothes could almost be called conservative and her subtle makeup actually did what it was supposed to, enhance her beauty. Logan just couldn't buy that he'd contributed to most of her DNA sequence.  
"I don't think SHIELD's too happy with me right now."  
"SHIELD's never happy. They'll get over it. I didn't call you out here to chat about that."  
"You're not going to try and kill me again are you?"  
"Please. You're not any fun to kill, you don't fight back. Besides I owe you now, so I suppose killing you would be in poor taste now wouldn't it? Besides I think I know what happened to your friends, or at least I know a way to find them."  
"Why are you helping us?" Logan asked immediately suspicious of her motives. A look that could have been sadness or guilt darkened her bright green eyes.  
"Because I think it's my fault that they are in trouble."

* * *

Rogue was dying. She knew death well because she'd already had a brush with him once before. It was maybe the only time that she'd been glad for her mutant powers. She couldn't breathe and her frantic movements were using up what precious oxygen she had left. She heard a watery beep and a clicking sound and then she was deposited on the floor of a very white room coughing up what felt like every organ in her body.  
"You shouldn't have rebelled. It would have hurt a lot less." A little girl with braids framing each side of her face said. She had brown hair that was dotted with blue ribbons. She wore what almost looked like a first communion dress and her feet were bare.  
"Rogue what am I going to do with you?" Her adult voice did not match her child body and for the first time Rogue was desperately afraid. The girl had struck a pose with her head cocked to one side, hand on her hip one finger wagging at her.  
"I think you need to be punished." The room began to swell and swirl like a bad acid trip. Rouge closed her eyes and fervently wished to live. When she opened her eyes she was surrounded by land mines.  
"One false move and you'll hear a click, that will be the last sound you hear. Though I suppose you could get lucky and only lose a leg or such." The girl giggled, skipped playfully in between the mines and walked out of a door not five feet away. Rogue wanted to curl up and cry, but she couldn't. She might set off the land mines.

* * *

"Look, I didn't do it on purpose. I don't think threatening you or your friends would be the best way to hurt you. I think it would just piss you off instead. Besides, tactfully, threatening is just a way for someone to get something they want without usually having the means to enforce the threat."  
"Why do you think it's your fault."  
"Look I'd show you, but I need a computer and some other stuff that I don't have here."  
"Let me guess, you want an invite to the Institute."  
"I know you have the necessary equipment."  
"Let me ask you a question first." She arched one eyebrow at him, which Logan took as consent.  
"Why did you pick this place to meet me?" Logan saw her lips twitch and if she'd known how to laugh, he thought she probably would have.  
"I used to work here. It's my home when I'm in the NY area."  
"How old are you?" Logan asked incredulously.  
"You said I only had to answer one question, so let's go.' With that she walked out. Logan just shook his head and followed.  
  
- -Twenty Minutes Later- -  
  
Logan and X23 were walking up the driveway to the Institute. Logan thought he should say something, but for the life of him, he didn't know what. He wanted to say something though.  
"I believe you've already seen the place." Mentally he winced.  
"It was dark and I didn't come to see the furniture. I'm still not. But I do know the general layout of the building." Logan turned and grimaced. Roger and his crew were loitering in the doorway. They were supposed to be fixing one of the many windows that Logan and X23 had smashed. As they walked through the door, Logan and X23 found themselves the head of an annoying entourage.  
"Hey chickee! What you doin' with this old geezer. Come with me and I'll really show you around." Roger thought he was such a smooth operator. X23 stopped, her eyes narrowed, her nostrils flared, and Logan swore he heard her growl. She marched over to Roger and grabbed him by the neck with one hand and held him in the air a good three inches off of the ground.  
"Does it look like I need any help from you? Did I even address you?" Alyssa and Golem made movements as if to help Roger, but X23 just glared at them and said, "Don't."  
"You'll kill him!" Alyssa wailed.  
"I won't kill him, though I should and rid the world of his stupidity. Look I don't know who you think you are you spikey-haired, preppy, arrogant little prick, but if you ever say anything to me that is in any way disrespectful ever again I will cut off your balls and force feed them to you. Got it?" Roger must have made a feeble nodding motion because she dropped him. Roger clutched his throat and scooted away from X23. He seemed to be trying to burrow into the wall.  
"If you'd be so kind, seeing as how you are a guest in my house, to refrain from terrorizing my students." Professor Xaivier had entered the room and he was not entirely happy. "Now, I believe we have something to discuss."  
"Lead the way baldie." X23 drawled. Logan didn't think it was possible for the professor to wheel around that quickly.  
"That will end now. You talk of respect to my students, I suggest you start showing some yourself." X23 just stared at him. After awhile the professor turned back around and led the way to an elevator. "I believe Hank has everything you need set up.

* * *

Rogue could not understand why she was about to attempt what she was about to do. All she knew was that she had to get out of here and in order to do that she had to get across the minefield. Of course, she did have one advantage in that she could see the mines, but still, one false step, and she'd be splattered across the walls. She slowly began to pick her way in between the mines.  
"Thank you Mama for making me take them damn ballet lessons." (A/N: OMG! Rogue, BALLET! 0.0, what am I thinking?) She looked across the room at the door. It suddenly seemed a lot further away than it had before. Rogue continued to desperately try and keep her balance. She hoped that it was worth it.

* * *

X23 followed the professor and Logan down a hallway. She hadn't really meant to be such a bitch, but during her last encounter with Logan she realized that there were people her were still looking for her. She'd thought they'd given up on her a long time ago. She was suddenly afraid, and she was willing to admit it, at least to herself. She was becoming very paranoid again. It made her very tired. She wasn't paying attention, which is why she ended up running into a wall of very solid muscle and being knocked flat on her ass.  
"Are you all right?" A concerned Hank McCoy bent over to ask her where she lay sprawled.  
"Fine, fine." She muttered. Hank bent over and offered a very large, meaty hand to help her up, a very large blue hand that is. She looked up and was confronted with a very ape like man, but looking into his eyes you knew he wasn't scary. In fact he seemed almost vulnerable, which is why she put her hand in his and actually let him help her up.  
Hank was amazed. This girl hadn't recoiled in fear like so many others had upon seeing him for the very first time. She'd even touched him without hesitating. It was very curious to him. Although he found so much about life curious which is why he made such a brilliant scientist. His love of science was actually partially to blame for his current appearance.

* * *

"I tried to find everything you said you needed. However I was not sure where to find those cables you asked for."  
"Have no fear, Gambit's here." A tall man with red eyes and a trench coat entered the room.  
"Well aren't you just tall, dark, and mysterious. Now why should I have no fear?" X23 quipped.  
"Cuz I have secured these ever elusive cables for you."  
"Be still my heart. Now beat it." X23 had no stomach for flirtations. Gambit extended his hands, proffering the cables that seemed somewhat strange to everyone else. X23 went over and took them. She cocked an eyebrow at Gambit.  
"Nice job, these are hard to steal, and I know that you stole them because that's pretty much the only way to get them. I think I may actually be impressed."  
"What makes them so special?" Hank asked.  
"They'll keep people from being able to track my cyber trail. Plus, they'll help in case we stumble across encryption."  
"I may not be some computer genius but that sounds like hacking to me. You never said anything about hacking." Logan snarled.  
"But darlin' you never asked so get over it." Replied X23. She continued to hook cables and such to the computer. She finally managed to get the computer up and running. No one else present really understood what she was doing, except maybe Hank. After awhile data streams began to float across the screen and take on a shape. But then the image was lost and X23 gave an exasperated slam to the tabletop startling everyone present.  
"Come on you psychotic cyber bitch I know you're in there so come on out and play already." She growled under her breath. Eventually the image came back. It took everyone a couple of seconds to realize that they were staring at a face.  
"What the hell is that?" Logan asked.  
"Here name is Angela." X23 replied. "She's one of HYDRA's pets. She was a little girl, a mutant possibly when they got their hands on her."  
"What were here abilities?" The professor asked.  
"No one was ever really sure. Rumor has it though that she was brilliant at screwing with your head."  
"Mind control." The professor brilliantly deducted.  
"That was always my assumption, but I also always had a feeling that there was more to it."  
"Interesting." This from Hank.  
"X23..." Logan began awkwardly.  
"Just call me X, it's easier."  
"Oh, ok. X why do you talk about her in the past?"  
"Some people might consider her dead. No one's ever seen her body in the past thirty years. She only lives in the computers now. HYDRA discovered something to do with her brain. So they actually tried to make her into a super-computer. Mind you, they kept her pretty well contained, but then she learned how to hack and discovered the Internet. After that all hell broke loose. However, living in the computer systems seems to have limited her abilities somewhat."  
"How so?" Asked the professor.  
"Because she thinks like a machine and expects everyone else to do likewise."  
"You speak as if you know her personally."  
"I do. They used to make me play chess and such against her. You know, to learn strategy. I'm the only one that ever managed to beat her."  
"Because all the kids that played her believed that she was fully a computer. She's still human and therefore is doomed to make stupid mistakes rooted in emotion."  
"You just said she thinks like a machine."  
"Yes and I said she expects everyone else to do likewise. Her superiority syndrome is one of her biggest weaknesses. Usually a simple solution will jam her circuits for hours."  
At that point the image on the screen became clearer and the little pig-tailed girl on the screen spoke. "What do you want? Aren't you supposed to be hiding from me?" X23 snorted.  
"I don't hide from anyone."  
"Well what do you want?" If the little girl on the screen had a foot to stamp, that is definitely what she would have done. X23 had ignored this temper tantrum and been loading something during it. The girl on the screen let out a wail.  
"You ungrateful little brat! This isn't any way to get back your friends."  
"First of all, they aren't my friends. Second of all, I'd think twice before threatening them. Fair Warning." With that she hit enter and the image on the screen dissolved and X23 kept up a furious tattoo on the keyboard. After awhile a screen came up with the title:  
Project: ELIJAH  
Status: Failed  
Access Password:   
The cursor blinked waiting for her to type something in. She tried a couple of times each time registering a flashing ACCESS DENIED.  
"Damn it!" X23 yelled. She closed out the screen and drew up another one.  
"What's this?" Hank asked.  
"A back door. Stryker put better protection on these files than I thought."  
"Stryker worked for HYDRA?" Logan asked.  
"No, but he worked for Angela whether it was by choice or not, well does it really matter?" X23 typed a couple more things and suddenly they were staring at the schematics for Project: ELIJAH, even thought they could barely comprehend any of it.  
"Professor Xaivier?" X23 asked somewhat tentatively. "Can you find someone on Cerebro just by having a picture?"  
"I might be able to. Tell me more about who I am trying to find." X23 was already downloading the picture. She sent it to print then quickly logged out of as many windows as she could. Angela's face appeared on the screen again, only fuzzy and her voice came out full of static.  
"And what were we looking up?"  
"Have fun Angela." X23 said as she shut the computer down. Then for safe measure she unplugged it.  
"What did you do to her?" Gambit asked.  
"Sent her a virus so that she would be paying more attention to that instead of to what I was looking up. Oh, you're going to want to trash that computer."  
"I'll wipe the hard drive." Hank said.  
"No I mean you're going to want to literally trash that computer, smash it up, burn it, I don't care what, but you do not want Angela to invade any part of this house, so all that stuff has to go."  
"You could have told us that before hand."  
"No, because then you would have given me an older computer that didn't run fast enough. I'll be more than happy to compensate for the loss." She turned around and handed a photograph to the professor. A little boy with dirty blonde hair and large blue eyes stared solemnly out at him.  
"His name is Elijah. He's about 8 but don't seem surprised if when you find him he seems older, if you can find him that is." The professor went off, up for the challenge.

* * *

Rogue was almost at the door. At the moment when she was most precariously balanced, something terrible happened.  
"BOO!" The girl was back.  
_Click.  
_ It truly was the most horrible sound. The last sound that she would hear in her life. Rogue had stepped on a mine. The little girl laughed and laugh that no child should ever have.  
"Boom." She whispered. "You're dead."


	7. PROJECT ELIJAH

A/N: Just a reminder I don't own any of the characters except for the few that you've probably never heard of, those I definitely made up. I own Angela and Elijah. PS if I write about a mutant that sounds like one that already exists, but I give them another name, it's only because I don't know the other one exists and I think it would be a pretty safe bet that there could be multiple mutants with at least somewhat similar powers.  
  
Oh and the character Angela comes from me being thoroughly confused by the movie Resident Evil, but don't watch it, I've been told the game is three million times better and I believe that.  
  
Chapter 7: PROJECT ELIJAH  
  
The professor had been in Cerebro for a long time. X23 had left the downstairs rooms and wandered off somewhere. Everyone else was just confused.  
"Don't look at me for explanations." Logan muttered after X had left. It was easier to think of her as that, the number had made it awkward.  
"I wish she would have told us more about the computer program called Angela." At this point Logan got up and left. Angela, the program, whatever, that was the girl from his dreams. It confused him. He didn't understand why she was targeting him. He pretty much knew if he wanted answers, he was going to have to find X. Now, where was she?

* * *

The mutant in question was currently wandering around near the living area. She was being closely watched by Roger whether she knew it or not, chances were that she did. It all looked so different in the daylight. She supposed it looked like what a mansion converted to a school looks like, but she wouldn't know, she'd never really been inside any kind of house before. All the kids were looking at her and for the first time in a long time she felt self-conscious. She didn't really enjoy the feeling.  
"Hey, you a new recruit?" A pleasant looking kid with brown hair and glasses that made his grey eyes seem huge and innocent had come over. She couldn't be sure, but she thought she'd seen him hanging out with Roger. It wouldn't have mattered if he had or hadn't been an associate of Roger, she was suspicious by nature. She'd been created that way.  
"Not exactly." She replied.  
"My name's Alan." He held out a hand.  
"That's nice." She ignored the extended hand.  
"I could show you around the school. Show you the stuff that teacher's don't show you until much later into training." Although she didn't trust him, this tid bit intrigued her. Were these people more technologically informed than she had first believed?  
"Ok Alan, play tour guide."

* * *

Rogue was dripping sweat by now. She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream. She wanted to beat the shit out of the smarmy little brat who was still laughing her head off at her. Most of all, she didn't want to die.  
"This can't be happening." Rogue said out loud.  
"Oh, but it is. You know, if you had stood there like a good little girl, I may not have had to do this."  
Rogue was in a panicked state. She had to be, because when she looked down the mines were gone.  
"What's going on?" She gasped and suddenly the mines were back. "This isn't real." She was tempted to laugh giddily. The little girl stamped her foot.  
"No fair! You cheated!" The room reverted back to what it had looked like before the appearance of the girl. The girl disappeared, she wasn't real. Rogue walked over to the door and pulled.  
"Figures." She muttered to herself. The door was locked.

* * *

X23 followed Alan into an elevator. So far she had yet to be impressed. Alan knew that, but she would be by the end of the tour. He hoped he lived to enjoy this. Roger and Alyssa had both been pissed when they had recounted Roger's humiliation. Golem as usual just stood there in silence. Roger wanted revenge, only he wouldn't be able to deliver it himself. So he'd sent Alan instead.  
Alan was good for this kind of thing mostly because he looked harmless. Granted, Roger had come up with this plan. The elevator stopped.  
"After you." He motioned like a true gentleman.  
"I'd really rather not." The girl replied. Damn, she really was an ice-cold bitch.  
"Suit yourself." He shrugged and exited the elevator.  
"So where are we going?" She asked from behind him.  
"You'll see." Alan replied and led the way. They were walking down a long white hallway. There was only one door at the end. Eventually they made their way down there and Alan opened the door.  
"Here we are."  
"Where is here?" This was an area of the building that X had never seen before or known about and she'd had a pretty decent map of the place. She'd walked ahead of Alan so she was further into the room than he was to get a better look of the place.  
"This is where we train. We call it the Danger Room. Ready for your first session?" He was out the door and closing it faster than she could process what was going on. He logged in the hardest level he knew of. "Let's just see how indestructible you really are."

* * *

Mentally she was smashing her head into a wall repeatedly. Why on Earth hadn't she gone with her instincts? She'd made a run for the door but had only ended up smashing into it. She slammed the steel-coated door with her open palm in frustration, but only succeeded in making her hand hurt. Then the situation got worse. Things in the room began to move.  
The room was circular and very bright. In the center of the circle an axis had risen and blades that extended all the way to the walls burst forth. That would have been fine except they began to rotate. She was trying to avoid them when walls began to spring up from the floor trapping her. She was working on pure instinct now. She jumped, dug her foot claws into the floor/wall thing and made it to the top. Then she jumped on top of the whirling blades and made her way to the axis. Something told her if she destroyed that, everything else in the room would stop too, or at least she hoped it would.

* * *

Logan was headed toward Cerebro when the doors opened and the professor came out.  
"Where's X23?" The professor inquired.  
"I thought she'd be waiting here. She's no where else I've looked." The professor closed his eyes and mentally scanned the house. Almost immediately they flew open.  
"She's in the Danger Room." The professor wheeled passed him.  
"The what?" Logan asked.  
"Follow me." The professor went through a door that Logan had never seen before. It turned out to be an elevator and it only went one way, down.

* * *

She really hadn't thought this plan through thoroughly and getting to the center axis was proving to be harder than she thought. Now she was on one of the rotating blades, but advancing was nearly impossible since one of the blades above her was hell-bent on decapitating her. To her dismay something else had started up. Guided projectiles kept trying to knock her off. She did the only thing she could think of; she went up.  
Intermittently dodging rotating blades and whatever else was flying through the air she painstakingly made her way towards the top. The walls started to shift. Blocks began to undulate in and out of the walls, trying to knock her off the blades or squish her. She was really getting tired of this. Finally she made it to the top of the axis. She was still being bombarded and she was having some trouble keeping her balance, but at least she had more time to think. She extended her claws, turned her back, timed everything perfectly (she hoped) and jumped. She tore huge gashes in the metal of the axis as she made her way down. As long as nothing new popped up, she would not end up looking like the contents of a blender.

* * *

"The door's been jammed." Logan said after trying five times to get the controls to obey their master.  
"Not jammed. The door won't open until the session is over. She'll have to beat it or lose, however, this level has never been really tested before." He left the doom part unspoken.  
"Can't we try to bust down the door?" Logan asked. The professor sighed.  
"I suppose you could try, but they are very thick, and I'd rather you just wait until Hank tries to over ride the system." Just as Logan was about to do something, the doors slid open and X23 stood there none the worse for wear. Behind her stuff immediately fell apart with a loud clatter. She winced at the noise and fell to her knees. She was bleeding across her torso.  
"Here I thought you just hid in this school all day and taught boring stuff." After a moment she stood back up, not a scratch in sight. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go kick the crap out of some people." She marched past them.  
"Just, don't kill them." The professor said. Logan stared at him as if he'd never seen him before in his life.  
"Death's too good for them."

* * *

Rogue was stuck and she knew it. For some reason the door had felt threatening so she crouched in the farthest corner away from it. To be honest, once the little girl had gone away she'd quickly grown bored. She had run out of all her bright ideas. Disgusted with herself she got up and began pacing. She was getting out of here one way or another. She marched over to the door and began kicking it with all the force she could muster. Little by little the door began to give. Suddenly it burst forward and slammed into the wall on the other side. The sound of impact echoed like a shot and Rogue's heart jumped into her throat.  
After several minutes she realized that no one was going to come investigate the noise so she tentatively made her way into the hallway. It was a pretty non-descript hallway. There were no doors and there seemed to be no end in sight. She had to choose, right or left. Since she wanted to go right she decided she should probably go left. She turned and headed down the hall. It seemed to be a one way kind of hall, when she reached a corner it only went right, so she followed it. Leave it to her to get stuck in such a maze. She truly began to despair when she came upon her kicked in door and realized she'd gone in a circle. She decided she'd just hang out in the room she'd come to in. Immediately the little girl appeared in the corner. She had her back to Rogue and seemed to be playing with something. Rogue was very tired, she thought she might lie down and take a little nap...

* * *

  
  
Twenty minutes later, X23 was back in the professor's study.  
"I believe I may have found your friend." He handed her a map. "I have full confidence that you will find him and bring him back here."  
"And why would I be doing that?" She asked as she scanned the map.  
"Because I just let you terrorize two of my students and they are our friends at risk. We want to know what you are doing before you do it so we can prevent you from getting them killed. For assurances I'll be sending Logan and Gambit along." X23 shrugged. Everyone was a little surprised that she didn't argue back. They had to go outside to get to the garage. Logan and Gambit tried not to laugh at the sight of Alan and Roger strung up the flagpole, but ended up snickering anyway.  
In the garage they found three bikes and some clothes. X23 got on the foremost bike, pulled out the helmet although she didn't really need it and gunned it. Right before she pulled the visor in place she threw a casual look over her shoulder.  
"Try and keep up boys." Then she floored it out of there. The so called "boys" looked at each other and then scrambled to catch up.  
  
- -1 Day and a Half Later- -  
  
The town they arrived in was practically dead. X23 had decided she didn't much like Arizona, so they would get in, get what they came for, and get out. The only motel was five miles out from town. They'd left the bikes there, but with any luck they wouldn't be staying there. They had to go the rest of the way on foot. Eventually they came upon a large, abandoned building.  
"We're here." X23 said. Logan and Gambit stared at the building.  
"It's abandoned." Gambit supplied intelligently. X23 fought off the urge to smack him.  
"This lab hasn't been used since too many of the projects started failing."  
"Are the people we're looking for in there?" Logan asked.  
"No, but if we want to find them, I suggest we get to work."

* * *

After two hours Logan and Gambit were beginning to wonder why they were still walking around in circles when suddenly X23 walked to an elevator and pressed the only button there. They ended up in a lower part of the building. Gambit started to move down the hall when X23 put an arm up stopping him.  
"Stop." She commanded.  
"Why?" Gambit asked. X23 moved closer to the wall. She seemed to be searching for something. She smashed a fist into the wall hard, even Logan and Gambit felt a shudder through the floor. On top of that, they heard something clicking and turning, almost like gears grinding together. From various points in the wall, laser beams burst forth, one was inches from where Gambit was standing.  
"Old security system." X23 said before Logan could ask why an abandoned building would still need to be guarded. "Guess just because the project failed, didn't mean they didn't want some stranger to come wandering in here."  
"How do you propose we get past these?" Gambit asked.  
"Climb through."  
"No way, even if I ever could have done something like that, I certainly wouldn't want to try now."  
"Fine," said X23 "What do you propose we do instead?" Gambit was already pulling out a card. With precision aim, he threw it at a key panel that must control the lasers across the room. On impact the card exploded and so did X23. Her patience had run thin.  
"You idiot!" She hissed as somewhere deep inside the bowels of the building an alarm began to sound, and other safety measures began to be set lose.

* * *

They'd run into a part of the building that looked like an open warehouse. So far they hadn't run into anyone or anything, but even they knew their luck was about to run out. They could hear something that howled coming their way and on top of that running footsteps. If the noise was any indication, they were slowly being trapped. X23 took a gigantic leap and swung herself up onto a catwalk that was above them. She didn't have time to take the stairs.  
"Where are you going?" Hissed Logan.  
"Well, you've already blown what little cover we had, so I'm going to get what we came here to get. In case it hasn't dawned on you, if we ever get out of this building, we are definitely not ever going to get back in." With that she took off.

* * *

In the few minutes that X23 had been gone, things had begun to go very wrong. The first wave of guards flowed into where Logan and Gambit were standing like sitting ducks. Of course the same guards were quickly disposed of, but if more than five flooded the place at once, well they would be royally fucked.  
"X, if you can hear me, you'd better hurry!" Logan screamed at the rafters. He hoped X23 heard him, otherwise he just looked like an idiot.

* * *

Luckily for Logan, X23 had heard him, so he didn't have to feel or look like an idiot. Luckily for Logan, he didn't hear X23's response. She was busy trying to get a very heavy eight-year-old boy on her back while he was unconscious so that they could get out of here. However, her load was too heavy and when she tried to stand up she pitched forward headfirst into a wall.

* * *

"Both of you get up here, now!" X23'a voice came floating back down to them.  
"We're just a little busy." Gambit yelled back. The guards had charged, and there had been more than five of them. After much wrestling they managed to make there way to the catwalk area above.  
"Let's go." Said Logan. They took off in the direction of X23's voice. When they found her she pointed at an opening in the wall.  
"Service elevator from when they must've built the place. It should take us back to ground level."  
  
- - Back at the Mansion - -  
  
X23 burst through the door first carrying the small boy in her arms. To everyone else the boy looked dead. She stopped the first kid she saw.  
"Where's Hank?" She snapped.  
"H-h-he should b-be down in the b-basement where he usually is." The poor child stammered. Something softened just a smidgen in X23 as she walked away. She turned.  
"Hey kid!" The kid actually squeaked. "You've been helpful." She was smacking herself. Why couldn't she have just said thanks? She shook it off and headed towards the basement. She hoped Hank knew as much about technology as he seemed to. 


	8. Dreams

Chapter 8: Dreams  
  
"Well can you fix him?" She looked at Hank who was peering curiously at the body sprawled on the table.  
"Absolutely ingenious." Hank murmured more to himself than to anyone else. "The integration of man and machine is just absolutely amazing." He hadn't thought that way at first. X23 had the sneaking suspicion that Hank had thought she had killed someone when he first glanced at her when she burst through his door twenty minutes ago. In all respect Elijah, who was the one laying on the table, was technically dead. Though technically speaking, Elijah wasn't exactly human either.  
"I'll have to do some scans and some preliminary observations to figure out how everything works together, but I feel pretty confident we could get him...um..."  
"Good. But none of this "we" stuff, it's just gonna be you."  
"But I thought—"  
"Forget it, you have the schematics, you'll be fine." X23 said gruffly and walked out. Hank sighed and began to get to work.

* * *

Logan was tired, and not just sleepy tired. He was bone achingly weary. It seemed every part of him hurt. It was hard work breaking into secure buildings, dealing with his only known living relative, and then dealing with all the kids at the Institute. Now on top of everything else, X23 had dumped that kid with them and then taken off. What bothered him the most about it was that it sounded like something he would do. He guessed responsibility wasn't their strong suit. He flopped back on his bed and almost immediately dropped off into sleep.  
  
--Dream Sequence--  
  
"Don't go in the door."  
"Why?"  
"Bad things happen in there."  
_ Have I been here before?_ Logan was back in the hall with the door as usual looming up at the end. He slowly started to proceed towards the door. Every motion seemed to spread across eternity. Every sound seemed to reverberate and overlap in a deafening roar. Logan looked back. The girl was standing there again. She raised her head. This time her hair was slightly parted.  
The floor creaked and groaned under his weight. Cracks were spreading out in all directions around him. He knew he was going to fall. Right before he did, he thought he saw a flash of bright green eyes. Then he was falling into darkness turning and tumbling through space, lost and alone.  
  
--End Sequence--  
  
Logan sat up like three thousand volts of electricity had been run through his entire body. He was covered in sweat and gasping for breath. He was terrified and he didn't understand why.

* * *

X23 was back at Pandora's Box. So far no one had come barging in, demanding what the hell she was doing. She took that as a good sign and yet, she was also experiencing an unidentifiable emotion underlying her sense of relief. _Disappointment perhaps?_ A voice in her head said.  
"Shut up." She growled out loud to herself. She was tired. She hadn't understood why she didn't want to help Hank with Elijah. She knew he would demand reasons so she'd left. _More like you ran away. You just couldn't bear to be responsible could you? It's already too late for that._ That annoying voice again...if it were possible to kick your own ass X23 had a feeling she'd be doing it a lot.  
X23 groaned and rubbed her head. She was sitting on a bed in one of the back rooms, not one used for business. It was where she'd been hanging out for awhile. No one cared about where she went or what she did. The pale green walls were bare and the bed definitely wasn't comfortable.  
"Probably why it isn't used for business." X23 spoke to no one. She'd really have to stop doing that. Besides she wasn't here for comfort, she was here because no one seemed to look for her at strip clubs. The noise from downstairs pounded throughout the whole building and made everything vibrate.  
"I hate this place." She stoically said as she propped her back up against the wall. After a couple of minutes her head began to droop. She couldn't remember...ever...being this...sleepy. X23 was finally asleep after weeks without any. It was a state of being that she never could get the hang of, it left her feeling vulnerable, something she just didn't want to feel ever again.  
  
--Dream Sequence--  
  
"Where we goin?" A much younger X23 asked a much larger person in a lab coat as they walked down the hall. She must've been about eight because her hair was much shorter. For a brief period, she had no hair at all. She remembered how small she'd felt, especially since she couldn't see the man's face.  
"You are going to make new friends." The man's voice came out disjointed, not quite in sync with his mouth's movements. Only looking back on it could she pick up the subtle sarcasm that was in his voice as well. She had been so timid. She didn't want to go and meet new people. They wouldn't like her, she just knew they wouldn't. Suddenly, the gigantic back of the man in front of her moved aside and a doorway was revealed. Light shone from the inside making it impossible for her to see what was beyond the threshold. _Don't go in there. Bad things happen in there!_ X23's dream world wavered. That had never happened. Her mini-self gasped and grabbed the door handle. Heat radiated up her arm making it tingle. She was terrified. Her dream world righted itself. "Go on. You'll have fun, more fun than you've been having lately." Was that regret in his voice? She walked through the door only to have it slammed shut behind her. At least twenty other children around her age were already in the room. They all looked similar. It wasn't until later, when she first saw herself in a mirror that she realized they all looked like her, or maybe she looked like them?  
"That's the last one." The man said.  
"Good. Begin termination, then meet me in the computer lab. It seems everything is going to go wrong today." The man nodded and pushed a button.  
X23 was frantic. Something was horribly wrong. Something didn't...smell right? Is that what she wanted to say? Next to her a small boy fell. It must have taken only seconds, but to her it took an eternity. They were all going to die in here. All around her boys and girls of varying ages were choking. She fell to her knees and cried even though she didn't understand why. She just knew she didn't want to die.  
--End Sequence--

* * *

She opened her eyes. She was back in the room at Pandora's Box. The sound of children choking was overwhelmed by the pulsing rhythm of people trying to sell sex. She was nauseatingly claustrophobic at the moment. She opened the window and jumped to the alleyway below. If she'd been paying better attention she would have noticed that her arm was still vaguely tingling.

* * *

Rogue had fallen asleep. She hadn't wanted to, but something told her she hadn't had much of a choice in the decision. As soon as she closed her eyes, she knew the dream wasn't going to be about her.  
  
--Dream Sequence--  
  
She opened her eyes and immediately experienced a child-like fear. Above her a bright light blinded her and her head throbbed in time with her pulse. She wanted to go home. She wanted someone to turn of the light. She tried to move but found herself restrained.  
"Shh. Struggling will do you no good." A monster leaned over her. Something came towards her face and she closed her eyes.  
When she opened them again, she was in a tank, or at least that's what she thought it was. She looked up and nearly choked trying to scream. A giant piece of machinery with lots of tubes and wires seemed to be attached to her head. She looked at her arms; her whole body was attached to this machine. She tried to speak, but found she no longer understood how. Someone said something but she no longer understood what it meant to hear. She tried to move. She strained with all her strength. She even managed to get one arm free, but the wires snaked back into her arm almost as if they had a life, an intelligence of their own. Whoever had spoken walked out and slammed the door. She hated that door...  
  
--End Sequence--  
  
Rogue opened her eyes. She was still in the room where the mines had been. She groaned. Her head hurt and she wasn't even sure if this was real anymore. For all she knew, this room only existed in her head. Now she, Rogue, wanted to go home. Where was the rescue team?

* * *

Down in the bowels of the Institute, in the middle of the lab, in the deep of the night, something inside Elijah began to click and whir.  
_Accessing memory circuits_.

A deep voice spoke from the shadows behind the hospital curtains. "I'm sorry son, we have no choice. We don't have the money. These people, they say they can help you, they say they can take care of you in ways that we can't. Your mother and I, well, we think it's for the best." The man was really trying to convince himself. He didn't really think Elijah could hear him.

_ Circuit malfunction_.

The screen flickered. Static ensued. Then a grainy image took the hospital scene's place. Elijah woke up for the first time in years, he felt incredible. Everything seemed shiny and new. The wasting disease seemed to have been banished for good. His prayers had come true! Then he looked down and was instantly plunged into a nightmare. Below him his chest was laid open for all to see. A mechanical wonderland greeted his eyes. The epicenter or what should have been, his heart was missing. He tried to scream. "Your vocal circuits are not in place yet. Please try to lie still." The image became distorted, and once again a new image took the old one's place. A voice once again from the shadows spoke.

"Really Elijah, you're being unreasonable." Elijah sat in the middle of the room, a white tunic covered his monstrosity of a body, and a spotlight glared accusingly from above. They still hadn't given him arms and legs yet.

"I don't want to be reasonable. I want to go home."

"And ruin all the hard work we've gone through to help you? Think about it Elijah, you get to experience what no one else ever will. You'll get to live forever." The man spoke on a shaky whisper, part envy and part awe.

"I don't want to live forever." Elijah whispered.

_End memory load. Accessing visual circuits_.

Deep in the bowels of the Institute, Elijah opened his eyes for the first time in years. If he had still had tear ducts, he would have cried.


	9. Hide and Seek

**

* * *

**

A/N: ok, to start, i don't own these characters. and to end, yeah fanfiction is being just a tad f---ed up today and since it's like ten o'clock i don't feel like playing with it so sorry about the wonky format but you all look like intelligent people, i think you can figure it out.

**Chapter Nine: Hide and Seek**

Hank nearly fell backwards as he entered the lab the next morning. A look of surprise on a blue ape-looking man is quite an amusing sight indeed. Elijah looked up with a mechanical whirl. His chest was laid open for the entire world to see. Fortunately, due to his machinery there was no blood in sight. An extension of on of his fingers was making necessary repairs in his chest cavity.

"Hello." Elijah said casually as if it was normal to walk in on someone with their chest ripped open. He spoke with the voice of a child, but his eyes spoke of years possibly even beyond Hank. "I think it is safe to assume that you either work for Angela or you work for X23." Hank started to reply but was cut off by a voice from the doorway.

"More like I work for them right now." X23 walked into the room, eyes only on Elijah. Some might have even foolishly seen what they might term a mix of guilt and concern in her eyes. A brief staring contest ensued, one X23 lost. She was the first to glance away, grudgingly. "Look, I know you want to be left alone. I had no choice, Angela's back and she's throwing temper tantrums."

"Damn it, X! You promised you'd leave me alone, even if she came back." He looked at her. Hank swore she bowed her head in shame.

"Look, you want to spend the rest of your life hiding—"

"You sure are one to talk," he sighed, " I think I would have woken up anyway. She seems to have this annoying habit of hacking my circuits when she gets bored." He bore his penetrating ice blue stare into the very heart of X23. It seemed to be his way of saying that everything would be okay eventually, but for now, he was still pissed as hell. "So what's been going on and who is this?" Hank stepped forward.

"Allow me to introduce myself. I am Hank McCoy. I'm pleased to see you up and um…running."

"Mostly thanks to you. Not many people would have been able to get my neural circuits up and running so quickly. Hey! Maybe you could help me. Some of my machinery is quite out of date. I think I could trust you to upgrade me."

"I'd be happy to oblige you." X23 left the two tech geeks to combine forces and brain power. She closed the door to the lab quietly. She turned and wasn't surprised by the presence of Logan.

"Looks like you've known him a long time."

"It'd be hard not to, he's probably even older than you." He continued to stare somewhat menacingly at her and she sighed. "I'm pretty sure I'm enough like you for you to know that I'm not going to tell you anything."

"I'm just trying to understand where you came from."

"I don't even understand that or myself for that matter, so if you figure it out, you let me be the first to know. By the way, while I'm working here, leave me alone."

"What?"

"Believe me, I'd just try to kill you again."

"Try?"

"Fine, I'd definitely beat the crap out of you." Before he could comment she walked away. She couldn't start to like him. She couldn't afford it; she couldn't afford to like anyone. She headed down the hall. She figured she'd start setting up the computer that Elijah would need. To her chagrin, Roger and Alan were both in the room. She thought about avoiding a fight, for like a second, then walked in the room and sat before one of the computers. The gauntlet was thrown and the first move was theirs. She couldn't wait to see what they would do. Something told her, they'd surprise her.

* * *

Roger and Alan had both looked up in surprise when X23 walked into the room. They had thought she had skipped out on them especially after their last encounter. That wouldn't have been very fair considering they still had their revenge to instigate; it also wouldn't have been surprising. She hesitated in the doorway, then stiffened her spine to saunter into the room like she owned the place. Roger and Alan looked at each other. Either this would be a lot of fun, or it would be very painful. 

"We thought you skipped town, especially seeing as how we owe you a beating. Damn, I guess we bet wrong." X23 raised one eyebrow sardonically at them as if to say "you are actually bothering to talk to me you insignificant worm." Alan grimaced under her gaze. Uncharacteristically silent, Roger made a move for the chair closest to X23.

"So did you really kill that kid?" Alan blurted to fill the silence.

"Why don't you go down to the lab and check." Both jumped at the sound of her voice cutting into the air for the first time. X23 logged into the computer and began typing. Roger continued to sit quietly next to her and X23 continued to type.

"Why'd you come back?" Roger posed quietly so that hopefully only she would hear.

"What?" X23 completely froze.

"You came back? Why? You don't owe us anything, and I know you don't like anyone here."

"You have no idea how much I owe you." Alan perceived this as a threat, Roger only heard the regret. Moodily they both got up with a scrape of chairs and left without incident. X23 was right, they certainly had surprised her.

* * *

Several days later Elijah was updated and fully functional. X23 had used the time to get a better computer for Elijah. No one wanted to know where she got most of the equipment, as long as the cops didn't come to investigate. 

"Let the games begin." Elijah muttered as X23 plugged in the last jack into the base of his spine.

"Remember, if something happens, pull the plug."

"Yeah, yeah." Elijah muttered. His cynical nature had taken everyone by surprise. The attitude did not match his sweet, innocent, angelic child exterior. With one last sigh, Elijah closed his eyes and immersed himself into a stream of data. After about ten minutes, Elijah's voice filtered through the computer speakers.

"Man, the network has changed a lot since I've been out."

"Yeah, well don't soak up too much. We wouldn't want you to know everything."

"I already know everything."

* * *

A couple of hours later, Elijah had already found what he was looking for. He surveyed the plans for the lab where Angela was being housed, or at least her last known whereabouts. There seemed to be no security around the information. Elijah was instantly wary. Thousands of scenario's and probabilities rushed through his brain in about a second. 

"Hey, X, I'm going in." Elijah finally decided. Her response that he took as an okay was silence.

The first thing he noticed upon entering was that everything was wet. It wasn't just damp either. There was at least a foot of water covering the floor. The building was hazardous. If he'd been in the real world, the building would probably be waiting to be demolished. Dilapidated floor beams from what used to be the ceiling were dripping water down to the floor in varying rhythms. The sound echoes off of the walls making the whole room a gigantic Chinese water torture. Elijah had been standing there for two minutes and it was already driving him nuts. Elijah took a step forward and paused. He felt like someone else was here, watching him. He called up some codes and sent them looking for any interesting kinks in the pattern of cyber space. He mustered his courage and pressed onward.

Walking through the knee-deep water was not easy. Elijah had only made several faltering steps when a voice crackled out from the darkness.

"Elijah, what's going on? I don't like what I'm reading."

"What's the matter X? Worried about me?"

"I just don't want to be held responsible when you do something stupid."

"Don't worry, I sent out some codes to look around, they should be back any time now."

"Just don't do anything stupid. It's getting harder to keep contact with you." Something crashed into the water behind him. Elijah whirled around, heart pounding in his chest. It had been a long time since something had scared him like that. "What was that?" Elijah peered into the darkness. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. The splash of water had never finished splashing, midway through it had completely frozen in time. The air seemed to waver around it. Elijah stepped forward and circled around the splash. One more step and his leg came in contact with some of the frozen drops. A jolt went shivering up and down his spine. Something wrong was going on here. Elijah put out a tentative hand and touched the part of the splash that had just begun to arch out into droplets, sending the whole thing shimmying. Everything around the warped splash began to swirl.

Eventually time rearranged itself. Despite feeling a tad woozy, nothing about Elijah or anything around him seemed out of order.

"Let's play a game." Elijah whirled around, for the second time in a short while Elijah's heart was frantically trying to burst it's way out of his throat.

"Angela? Where did you come from?" Elijah turned and tried to contact X23. While normally he wouldn't be too concerned by X23's silence, there was no sound coming from the radio and he began to panic. Unfortunately for X23, Elijah had done something stupid.

"Let's play a game." The old program of Angela's insistently and a little more forcefully commanded. It seemed he'd have no choice.

"All right, let's play a game. What do you want to play?"

"I'll be hunter, you be prey." Elijah sighed. Leave it to Angela to enjoy one of the most challenging games she'd ever created.

* * *

Hunter/Prey was a game without rules with only one objective: kill or be killed. According to Anglea's twisted logic, only the hunter could actually kill, that is, if the hunter could find the prey. Being stalked is not a fun experience. To be good at being prey, and to survive you must possess only one quality: a healthy amount of paranoia. 

"Ready?" Angela stared at him with cold, glassy eyes.

"Yes." It was barely a whisper, but it was enough to begin the game. Elijah would get a slight head start, but it wouldn't matter, with all the water and what with being in a wide open space Elijah, to put it in X23's terms, was fucked. A flurry of emotions flitted through his mind like a thousand agitated bees: panic, fear, adrenaline…Thoughts that weren't helpful also fluttered around causing his neural circuits to begin to overload. He needed to calm down, and he needed to calm down now. Dodging, using chunks of debris to hide behind he made his way across the room.

Pausing to catch his breath, he noticed a grate in the side of the wall. He hoped that Angela wasn't looking or listening and pulled with all his strength on the grate. With a painful screeching sound the grate pulled away and Elijah dropped down into the opening. Pausing to catch his breath he realized how deathly quiet it had gotten on the ground level. All he could hear or focus on was his won rapid breathing.

"Boo!" Angela's face loomed up through the grate causing Elijah to jump in terror. He decided to quit thinking and let his instincts take over. He immediately headed down the long tunnel that the grate had led to. The pathway was black and impenetrable, however, this part of the building had remained mostly dry, so Angela wouldn't be able to track him by the sound of his footsteps as much anymore.

He continued down the path, stopping periodically to see if Angela was still behind him. Up until this point, he'd heard no sound, but now that he was paying attention, he could hear something, something not human. A low rumbling growl reverberated through the walls.

"We aren't the only monsters HYDRA created." Angela's voice came floating down the darkness to him. He immediately knew this was no longer a game and that he had to figure out a way out of there. He continued down the long dark tunnel, no longer caring if he was heard. Whatever else was in here already knew where he was, so hiding anywhere would be a pointless endeavor. Continuously being stalked down the hall, Elijah yelped when the floor stopped and he nearly plummeted forward. Some debris was knocked loose and he made out a faint splash below.

He nearly fell forward in shock at what he saw next. Elijah of twenty minutes ago walked through the door of the building and continued to wade forward looking around nervously. His search took him a little past where Elijah stared down open mouthed from above. He could almost hear X23 admonishing him not to do anything stupid.

"You're stuck in a time loop." Angela was again suddenly beside him out of nowhere. "Only one way to fix it." She said cheerfully as she joyfully pushed Elijah off of the ledge he'd been perched on. As he fell sound ceased. It was eerie. Right as he was about to smash into the water and then sequentially, the very hard pavement, time slowed. He barely brushed the water when the splash that had enthralled him earlier began to form. He saw himself come up to the splash. He watched his watery ghost tentatively reach out a hand and found himself doing the same. Elijah stood so that they were direct mirror images. As his previous self took a step forward so did he until, they'd meted into the same being.

At that moment time seemed to catch up with him and he found himself sitting in a foot of water just as the climax of the splash descended upon him guaranteeing him he would be soaked just in case splashing around in a foot of water hadn't done the job.

"What the hell was that?" X23's voice was a welcome if not loud distraction to the silence of the building.

"A warning."

"That was a hell of a warning, I'm pulling you back out now." Elijah just flopped back into the water and stared at the ceiling. _We aren't the only monsters HYDRA made._ Angela had actually supplied many warnings tonight, something that made Elijah nervous. Angela was not prone to be friendly. Immediately his large blue eyes popped open and he was staring into X23's flashing green ones. She wasn't happy. For once instead of yelling though, all she said was, "You'd better make sure no bugs came back with you," and "I downloaded the info your search bots sent back."

"It won't matter. Angela isn't going to be there. But I think I might know where she is."

* * *

Once again Logan found himself on a ferry with that unreasonable dread of water that he couldn't fathom, heading towards a house he never wanted to see again. At the fore of the ship Elijah stared into the water lost in thought. Logan watched in curiosity as X23 stalked up to him. 

"So…"

"So…" Elijah wasn't sure, but he swore he saw her mouth quirk ever so slightly. He had a theory that X23 did have a personality somewhere in there, it just happened to be taking a vacation currently…or like in a coma.

"You've not been your less than charming self since you went back into the network. You said Angela gave you a warning, what was it?" Elijah sighed, he had to give X23 some points, and she really did have a lot more patience than people thought she did. This was about the third time she'd only asked in a day and a half.

"Look, if I'd figured that part out, I wouldn't be so fucking nervous, now fuck off!" Elijah slammed his hands down on the boat railing. He nearly sobbed and then caught himself. X23 looked almost shocked.

"Okay, I may not be good at reading people, but I definitely know, that is not a normal reaction for you. What's going on?"

"I think I need to go and lie down." Elijah said and he hurried off. X23 turned and spotted Logan.

"What are you lookin' at old man?" She sneered. Logan just turned away. He was pretty sure that was X23's subtle way of saying to leave her the hell alone. This was already giving him a headache.

* * *

"It's a house." X23 observed intelligently. Obviously she wasn't impressed. "Ok, wait, let me get this straight. Angela's here." 

"Yes, back where it all started. Isn't that right?" Elijah turned to Logan. "Don't bother, I already know you've been here before."

"Yeah, the freakhouse from hell." Logan chimed in helpfully. "I do not want to go back in there."

"Whatsamatta? Scared of what goes bump in the night?" This was shot over the shoulder of X23's shoulder. Logan admitting fear had given her a boost in confidence.

"X, wait up! You don't know what's in there!" Elijah chased after her up the drive. X23 turned to look back at him. "Do you know what's in there?"

"No, not really, but I think we should all stay together."

"Fine, I'll be a team player."

"Yeah right." Logan snorted and kicked the door open. He had a very bad feeling about this. He always did.

* * *

The door opened slowly and with a small creak. The three of them stood silhouetted in the doorway like an image from a bad horror film. Surprisingly Elijah was the first one in the room. He immediately walked over to a panel in the wall. 

"We're going to have to do some serious hacking in order to get to where we want to go. Angela's not messing around." With that said he pulled a jack out of the panel and inserted it into his left eye. Logan mentally shuddered and looked down the hall at the door from his dreams, an ever potent presence that he wanted to forget.

"So where are we going?" X23 asked. She was suddenly very nervous. She felt as though she had been here before, but couldn't place when or why.

"Where do you think?" Elijah started sarcastically, but was interrupted by Logan's solemn interjection.

"Through the door." X23 looked between Logan and Elijah like a dog trying to watch a tennis match. Finally she muttered under her breath, "I'll be so glad when this psycho bitch is taken care of. Maybe then you people will start acting _strange_."

"Don't you mean normal."

"No." She turned and stalked down the hall. Taking a huge confidence boosting breath, she mimicked Logan and kicked in the door nearly unhinging it. Anything you can do, I can do better.

* * *

Deep inside the house, something moved. Something became aware. Something was startled. People were here. They weren't supposed to be here yet. The shell began to process. The shell wasn't supposed to be aware. The connection had been lost. Something was incredibly wrong. The shell left and went on the prowl. Maybe the shell could find a new home. The shell had lost part of itself earlier. The shell went to find it.

* * *

Back up at the panel, Elijah had established contact and was currently trying to get X23 to cooperate and conduct her through a series of steps that would keep them alive a little while longer, not an easy task with a girl as impatient as X23. 

"Are you sure I can't just smash it up?" She asked.

"Yes, you can't just smash it up." There was a long pause.

"Please?" She was almost pleading.

"Damn it, no! Now just do what I told you." She muttered something under her breath. Elijah didn't have time to pay attention. He was doing almost a hundred other things at the same time: disarming alarms and security measures, blockading viruses, looking for Angela, you know, non-important stuff like that. Something at the back of his mind began to tickle. It seemed almost like a presence. Elijah brushed it away with a flick of his hand. This caused the presence to fade away quietly, but I certainly wasn't going to be brushed away or ignored so easily.

The force came back. This time it was much more insistent. Since Elijah was busy trying to do a hundred other things at the same time, the presence found it easy to slowly invade his mind. The tickling gradually became an annoying buzz, which began to become a burning sensation. The pain inside Elijah's head faded down to a tingling sensation that eventually became a numbness that oozed into all his neural circuits. Paying more attention to what X23 was doing he barely registered the strange sensations.

"You should be good to go from here." X23 gave no response. Elijah slowly filed through all his running processes. He came upon the sequence of events that had just taken place. His curiosity piqued and with time to kill he ventured after the trail of breadcrumbs the presence had left behind. It would be the last thing he remembered doing.

* * *

The room Logan and X23 entered was definitely out of a sci-fi freak's fantasy. The room was filled with tubes large enough to contain people. More specifically, the tubes contained all the people Logan was looking for. 

"You can't get them out." Logan and X23 whirled around. Elijah stood behind them with his head bowed. X23 stared intently at his blonde head. She could sense something different about him. She'd sensed the same thing on the boat ride over.

"What do you mean by that?" Logan asked completely unaware of the change that Elijah had undergone. Elijah raised his head and locked his piercing blue eyes with Logan's questioning brown ones.

"They have lost their minds for now. Even if you got their bodies out of here, they wouldn't be there." Throughout this whole exchange X23 had slowly backed away from Elijah. She needed time to think, she needed a computer, she needed to smash something, not necessarily in that order.

"You've been planning this for a long time haven't you?" She opted for the cliché banter between the unsuspecting idiots who'd just walked into a trap and the evil mastermind who knew the flies were already hung by the web.

"About seventeen years if you want to know the truth."

"Angela." Logan cut in helpfully.

"Brilliant. I suppose you really do have a brain in there." Elijah gave a high pitched giggle that was mangled by his lower toned voice. Without warning X23 ran for the door behind her. Logan wasn't sure what was going on, but he figured he'd be safer in a room with X23 than with Angela. They slammed the door shut and leaned against it.

"What's the big idea?" Logan gasped.

"You haven't seen all that Elijah can do." was all he got in reply. At that moment something slammed into the door behind them.

"You hold the door down." X23 said as she ran for a computer. Apparently luck decided to bet on X23 because they had conveniently run into a computer lab. Something flickered on the screen as soon as soon as she started searching.

"Hurry up!" Logan barked from the doorway. He was losing the battle.

"C'mon." X23 replied as she took off for the door that was positioned opposite of the one they had entered through. The door behind them exploded. There was no other way to describe it. Hinges warped the door so that it leaned drunkenly in its frame. Wood splintered into thousands of little shards. Logan chanced one look behind him and immediately wished he hadn't. Elijah, Angela, whoever, was surrounded by a cloud of electronics and technology. Before his very eyes the parts rearranged themselves and became extensions of Elijah's body parts. He was now at least as tall as X23 and his one arm had become a mass of metal. The fingers were long and needle-like. You wouldn't want to be cut by them.

"I told you, you hadn't seen all that he could do."

"Holy shit!" Logan muttered

"Holy shit is right." X23 replied. "C'mon, this way."

They were hiding. They had been for about twenty minutes now.

"What are we doing?" Logan was growing impatient. So was X23.

"Ok, when I got on the computer Elijah sent me a message, the real Elijah, not Angela in Elijah's body."

"Explain that first."

"When Elijah went into the net to look for Angela, I think Angela found him first. I think she downloaded part of herself into Elijah. It wouldn't surprise me, she'd older than he is. Angela's been wanting a new body almost since they turned her into a computer. I think she tried to take over one of your friends, but because Angela's raw data, and your friend's brains I am assuming are organic it won't work."

"But Elijah has an organic brain too, doesn't he?"

"True, but he also has neural circuits, and mechanical parts. Which is perfect for Angela because now that she's developed that nice big brain, she doesn't want to lose it. Elijah provides the best of both worlds."

"Ok, fine. This is all just a little too fucked up for me. So how do we free my friends?"

"Elijah's working on waking them up. We have to find and destroy the equipment imprisoning them."

"Fine, let's go."

"According to the plans we should be clothes, but we've got to quit running from room to room."

"How do you propose we get there then?"

"The air vents."

"C'mon, even I find that predictable."

"Exactly. It's too simple and predictable. Angela will never even bother to look there." Logan suddenly grabbed her arms.

"You'd better not be fucking around here." X23's response was to extend the claws in her foot and kick him in the stomach.

"Believe me, you'd know if I was fucking around with you." She walked across the room and pulled up the grate and jumped down. After half a minute Logan grimaced and followed her.

* * *

After twenty minutes of shuffling around in the darkness, the sound of their breathing their only form of communication, they finally saw light. X23 scooted ahead enough to turn around and they both proceeded to peer into the room below them. 

"Where are we?" Logan asked.

"I think we're here." X23 replied stoically.

"You think? You think!" Logan's blood began to pound through his head, not a good sign.

"The maps I'm working off of are old. We're just going to have to take a gamble." X23 pulled up the grate as quietly as she could and slithered over the edge and fell lithely to the floor to land silently in a crouch. Logan followed just as smoothly and just as quietly. X23 was impressed.

They were in a very long, bright hallway. It oozed trap and Logan and X23 proceeded accordingly, so that when nothing happened they were very concerned. Their objective had been a long white door at the end of the hallway. X23 reached out a hand and turned the knob easily and shoved open the door, both immediately leaped to the side so as not to get hit by anything that might come flying out to impale them. Nothing came flying out. So Logan and X23 went in.

* * *

_Where are you? _

I'm right here. There's nothing you can do now.

Angela!

Yes?

Why are you doing this?

Your plan won't work you know. If they destroy me, which I doubt they'll do, you'll still lose your body.

Angela!

Goodbye.

* * *

The room X23 and Logan entered had been just as dark as the air vents, but as soon as they stepped forward things immediately began to hum and whir with life. What predominated the scene was almost too obtuse to describe. In the center of the room was a large tank. Inside the tank was a liquid substance that bubbled in rhythm with the machines that made it work. Inside the liquid was a mass of tangled tubes and wires that spiraled down from the top of the tank and up from the bottom. At the heart of the mechanical mess was a twisted and shrunken body. The eyelids seemed to have been worn away and the great white orbs seemed to possess no pupils or irises. What little hair the being had left rose in stringy, watery clumps on what was otherwise as very bald head. The nose was barely there and a great, gaping, twisted jaw screamed grotesquely and silently at them. The skin had darkened to a mummified purplish-grey hue. The body was naked and literally skin and bones, the hands and arms crossed over the chest in what would otherwise have been a fairly serene pose.

(A/N: If you've seen The Mummy, picture when they very first open the sarcophagus and find him…. "He's still….juicy." lol)

"What is it?" Logan asked searching for the right words.

"Logan, meet Angela."

* * *

_So that's what you were up to. Clever boy. You know what we do to clever boys don't we? _

Go to hell Angela, and while you are at it, get the fuck out of my body!

Oh dear, I can tell you've been spending too much time with X23.

Angela!

Well, I guess I'll have to use other means to get to the end. Rogue, be a dear, and give our friends a nice warm welcome.

* * *

X23 stepped close to the glass and pressed her face close to it. Her eyes widened and she ducked and rolled in just the nick of time. She heard the sound of a fist smashing glass and looked up in time to see a pale girl with auburn hair with one pale stripe of white and black clothing with matching gloves take a leap at her. X23 kicked the girl off of her and rolled onto her feet with a snarl, whipping out her claws with that spine tingling sound.

Logan finally registering what was happening came up behind the girl and locked her in a giant bear hug, struggling to restrain in her. At the same time X23 charged at them. The only thing that Logan could do was dodge out of the way or risk being skewered.

"X! Stop!" Logan gasped out because Rogue had managed to wriggle slightly free and elbowed him in the ribs. X23 as usual didn't listen and cut a slash open in the girl's arm. The girl rolled away crying out in pain.

"X, stop!" Logan yelled grabbing for X23 no instead. "That's Rogue." X23 calmed down a bit, but not before bloodying him up a bit.

"What the hell is she doing?"

"I don't know." Logan would have speculated further except that Rogue launched herself at him again, and this time the gloves were off, literally.

* * *

_You're awfully quiet. Whatsamatta? Not enjoying the show? …Hey! Are you listening to me? What are you doing? Stop that! No!_

_

* * *

_

Logan was doing everything he could to keep Rogue's pale hand from descending any further towards his face. X23 didn't know what to do. She'd already hurt the girl enough as it was and any more damage she had in mind would kill her. Rogue gasped and weakened so Logan threw her off of him and unfortunately into a wall. When she stood up, he looked in her eyes and he knew she was back to normal.

* * *

_Oooh! You're no fun, but no matter, you only weaken yourself. _

Angela…you're so stupid…

* * *

X23 had gone back to staring at the glass while Logan tended to Rogue's wounds. 

"Yup. I think it'll work." X23 had walked over to the wall where the tank was. She had made a bat of a metal cylinder and once again stood before the glass. She closed her eyes and breathed for a second. Then she opened her eyes and with a yell swung the bat as hard as she could into the glass.

* * *

2 Weeks Later… 

Rogue and the others had finally been given a clean bill of health. Elijah was undergoing serious tests to make sure all traces of Angela were gone. Logan had just come from a visit with Rogue when he saw Elijah staring out of the window.

"You know, she didn't mind dying in the end. I think it's kind of what she wanted."

"That wasn't any way for anyone to live." Logan replied quietly.

"She left you know."

"I know."

"She'll be back, now that she knows she has you." Logan snorted. "You'll see. I have a feeling a lot of people end up coming back to this place."


	10. Memory Lane

Disclaimer: I so totally don't own the X-Men, but if I did, Marvel would probably make a lot more money...or would that be me that was making all the money? :)

A/N: I don't think I like the name for this chapter. So if anyone can come up with something better I'd love to hear it...or I can just leaved it un named, that might work too.

Ooh, when I started typing this it was September 19 which is National Talk Like a Pirate Day! So argh me mateys! There be some swashbuckling or someone be walking the plank! LoL yeah, my friend tried to have a whole conversation like that with me...I was laughing so hard I nearly cried.

Another Note: I tried to put Omega Red in here, and I was confused about something I may have read about him so if you think something I say is totally wrong, please send me the info stating otherwise, because I read in a bio that his metal tube thingys could suck life force out of people and I don't know how accurate that is.

**Episodic:** Always have to give a shout out to you. Be excited and very happy because HYDRA, Viper, Gauntlet, and Omega Red are finally coming back into my story!

**Curliest Guru**: Thanks for reading, I know I am such a pest, and I know you generally don't give a crap about the X-Men, but you can "blame" that on your mommy. Oh, and Angela is the one that "died" (dun dun dun!) in the last chapter. As you will quickly see, X23 is very much alive.

**Anyone else who has reviewed:** THANK YOU!!!!!! you couldn't hear it, but I was kind of singing that.: )

Whew! That is much too long, its sad that my first page is almost nothing but my silly drabble, but I don't do it often.

All right, finally, on to the chapter damn it!

**Chapter Ten: Memory Lane**

She slammed into the brick wall, her vision colored with bright vein looking bursts of red and orange. The warmth of her blood trickling down her face hindered her night vision, which was vital in the dark alleyway where she'd been blind-sided. Cold metal tubes wrapped themselves around her, squeezing, draining the life out of her. Cuts blossomed everywhere on her body, bruises beginning to flourish and spread like a disease beneath her skin. Everything inside her was going cold. She couldn't feel anything anymore. If she'd had enough breath, she'd probably have screamed. This is what it felt like to die. A cold empty nothing. She'd felt it before, and she didn't like it.

Just when she thought the pain might actually break her, she found herself falling to hit the ground with a squelching splatter of blood. She spat a gob of congealed and fresh blood onto the pavement. One arm curled against her chest, rendered useless, as she slowly tried to crawl away. She wanted to go to sleep. She wanted to curl up in a corner and cry. She wanted to be able to kick the crap out of this guy. She'd been mentally cursing herself since this fight began for being so stupid. She knew she wasn't going to be able to get away. She weakly tried to extend the claws in her hands. The metal slowly ripping its way through her already torn and shredded flesh inch by inch spreading fire through her entire body. She never saw the blow that would knock her unconscious.

"Rise and shine!" The voice sarcastically yelled in a singsong way, sending a splitting pain up her spine to throb right at the base of her skull. She knew whoever had spoken was not going to be someone she would be getting along with. "If you want your phone call, I suggest you get out of bed." X23 opened her eyes and was immediately blinded by the cheerful sunlight through a cheerful little cell window. Grateful that she'd been out cold so the likelihood of her claws being extended was slimmer than if she'd been dreaming. Now, the only mutant give away would be her miraculous recovery depending on when she got here. Just to be sure though, "How long have I been in here?" The warden or so X23 was assuming, a stocky shapeless blob of a woman swinging keys on a chain in front of her cell bars gave a cold little smile.

"Since about two yesterday morning. Mighty fine recovery time you had." _Shit._ Slowly hauling herself to her feet, she stumbled her way to the bars. Her hair was matted with dried blood so that it hung in natty, heavy clumps from her head. Her shirt was practically shredded to nothing. It too was full of blood. A shame so much of the blood was hers. Her jacket, well let's just say it definitely wasn't a jacket anymore, more like a dust rag. One of her pants legs was practically completely ripped apart at the knee. X23 winced, not a scratch in sight. She was still fuzzy after that beating, and she was definitely confused as to why she was in jail. She was about to ask when the warden cut in through the fog, "Move it or lose it sunshine." The warden opened the door and X23 stumbled out into the corridor.

After a couple of faltering steps X23 got the hang of walking again and managed to make it to the phone. While staring at her reflection in the ominous black phone, her face distorted by the curvature, she was suddenly struck with a quandary: she had no fucking clue who to call. After nearly kicking the crap mentally out of what little pride she had and several unnecessary prods from the warden, X23 finally picked up the phone and began to dial. She really hated to do this.

* * *

"Hello?" A little girl of about seven with glasses too big for her face and cute little pigtails answered the phone. After listening for several seconds she put down the phone and screamed at the top of her lungs, "LOGAN THE PHONE'S FOR YOU!" Then promptly turned and skipped back to the couch where she'd been watching _The Powerpuff Girls_. After about three minutes Logan came down the stairs and picked up the phone.

"Hello?"

"Logan? Crap, I told her to get the professor."

"Who is this?"

"Oh, no one important just some of your spawn that happens to be sitting in jail."

"What di—never mind, I'll be there as soon as I can." With that they both hung up the phone.

* * *

X23 had been conscious in jail for about an hour and she was going stir crazy. Short of pacing the cell like a caged tiger or always the more fun route of foaming at the mouth, you wouldn't otherwise have known she was so uncomfortable. Growing up in a prison had endowed upon her a little bit of claustrophobia, but it had also given a much larger chunk of patience than people gave her credit for. However, she'd reached her limit right about now and the warden wasn't helping any. If she'd had cigarettes she'd be frantically chain smoking them. As it was she sat pressed up against the wall, knees to her chest, doing something she hated to do: think.

* * *

"If you promise to behave you can come out now." The miniature X23 emerged from a dark, airless room, quite literally a tomb afraid and broken. This is why she feared death. She knew what death did to people. Death locked you away in a cold abandoned room where no one could find you anymore, that is if anyone was bothering to look. Deep inside the shattered pieces of herself something was growing. She took a step forward and without thinking whipped out her claws in her right hand and stabbed the man. The rage she was known for was born in that moment and the high that it gave her would last her a lifetime. She grabbed the keys and gingerly stepped over the body. She calmly walked back to her "room" which she now realized was nothing more than a prison cell, and locked herself back in. For the first time ever, X23 gave the closest thing to a smile.

* * *

"Hey you made bail!" The warden so rudely interjected. As she opened the door to the cell she added sarcastically, "I don't think I need to tell you to stay in town." X23 just shoved past her and walked to the lobby where Logan was waiting for her.

"You wanna fill me in?" He asked her.

"Fuck. I was hoping you'd be able to tell me what's going on." Logan sighed. By now they had reached a battered pickup truck covered in mud and Logan turned to her, "First of all, why don't you tell me what you do know. They told me you were pretty beat up. I had to do some fast talking to explain why you were all healed up." It was X23's turn to sigh. Then she frowned. She'd hoped no one would hear about her getting her ass beat, ever.

"Okay, here's what I do know. I was minding my own fucking business when I got blind-sided by some asshole. Now you're probably wondering why I didn't kick their ass, but I was in an open area, and in case you haven't noticed, it's not very cool to be a mutant right now. Then I was knocked unconscious and I woke up in jail."

"They said you attacked some guy and nearly decapitated him and I have to admit, if it weren't for your clothes, I might tend to believe them. And why are you calling me?" X23 didn't respond. "Earth to X."

"Screw it. Because you're the only one I could think of that would come for me." With that she turned to the window away from him. The rest of the car ride was spent in silence.

* * *

The first priority when they got to the mansion was a shower for X23 followed by finding some clothes for her. Of course Roger and Alan always up for causing trouble tried to sneak a peek at her while she was changing which of course resulted in an amusing scene of X23 chasing down and beating the crap out of Alan and Roger in jeans and a bra. Most of her clothes came from Rogue's closet so she ended up wearing black jeans, a very dark green tee shirt, and a pair of combat boots. X23 disappeared for awhile but turned up later with a waist-length black leather jacket. No one really wanted to know where she'd gotten it. It was probably better not to ask. X23 had her own fingerless gloves that she wore. They kept her from tearing up her own hands too much when she extended her claws. After some searching, she managed to pilfer a ponytail holder from someone's room and she put her hair up in a ponytail. After her little fiasco with Alan and Roger, X23 thought it better to find a place to hide. Besides just because the wounds were gone didn't mean that the pain disappeared with them. She was still sore and very tired which made her very crabby. She was smart enough to stay away from stupid people before they pissed her off.

She'd been wandering around the Institute when she came upon what she hoped was an abandoned room. She hurriedly walked in and closed the door, only to realize that it was very dark. As she walked towards what she hoped was a light switch, even with her superior nightvision, she managed to trip over something. That something was Kurt. After much scrambling, X23 managed to untangle herself and flipped on the light.

"I am sorry." Kurt said.

"It wasn't your fault. If I'd know the room was in use I would have found a different one to hide out in."

"Vhy are you hiding?" Kurt asked looking at her with his strangely demonic eyes. "Are you a new student? I don't think I've seen you before."

"No, I'm not a student. I'm just hanging out here for awhile. You can call me X."

"That is your name? One letter?" X23 sighed and surpressed the urge to roll her eyes, or strangle him.

"I don't have a name because I'm a mutant experiment. I've been raised in a lab to be the ultimate fighting machine and all they ever gave me was the number X23. However, I find it cumbersome to have to say the number all the time and not that I care what people think, it tends to make them uncomfortable. So yes, one letter."

"Vait, you are ze girl, ze one that helped Logan? I owe you thanks." X23 was taken aback. She wasn't used to being thanked for anything, hell, she wasn't even used to normal conversation if this could pass for it.

"Um...you're welcome I guess." An awkward moment ensued, but X23 didn't want to lose whatever it was that was going on right now. That and she really didn't have anything else to do. "So why are you hiding here?"

"I still scare some of ze students. Since I had some free time I thought I'd come up here and..."

"And what?" X23 felt that she was misjudging the situation. She felt as usual, she was doing more harm than good.

"Vell. Pray." X23 looked at him in confusion.

"Pray? What is pray?" She asked pronouncing the foreign word slowly, trying to get a feel for it. She also asked it fairly bravely considering she hated to admit weakness and stupidity. It was Kurt's turn to look shocked. He was used to people trying to get him to deny his faith, he wasn't used to people lacking any knowledge of religion. For the next couple of hours, Kurt tried to explain the basics of Catholicism.

"Basically, when you pray to God, he listens and he tries to help you anyway he can. It may not always be the solution you want, but he does answer, you just have to learn to listen." X23 sat crossed-legged across from him on the floor. She had propped her chin on her arm, which rested on her knee. She listened to him intently and over the past couple hours watched him become more animated, more comfortable. Now she raised an eyebrow skeptically at him. Kurt continued, "And if you do good things, and ask for forgiveness of your sins, you will receive the reward of heaven when you die." X23 actually pondered this statement. After awhile she finally said, "That's nice wishful thinking, for me anyway." She rubbed her head. She couldn't remember the last time she'd been this intellectually stimulated, this challenged. It didn't matter that she didn't understand.

At this point, Logan came upon them. "Do you know how long we've been looking for you two? We thought you'd gone and done something stupid to piss her off and they you'd left again." Logan directed the first to Kurt and the second to X23.

"Don't go all parental on me now, Logan, it's a little late for that and I'll have you know I'm not always out slicing and dicing. I have slightly more of a life than that." X23 practically taunted. It was so easy to jerk his chain.

"Well, the professor is not happy. Kurt's missed most of his classes today, and you, you were supposed to behave."

"I think I've been very good actually. And it's not like I forced Kurt to stay here against his will." By now, X23's blood had begun to boil, and they were almost practically yelling. Kurt prevented the eventual fight by doing something no one had heard him do yet: he began to laugh. He was laughing so hard he was nearly crying.

"What's so damn funny?" X23 and Logan asked in unison. X23 kept clenching and unclenching her hands, a sure sign she was about to extend her claws. The question posed in tandem made Kurt laugh all the harder. Eventually Kurt managed to gasp out, "It's just, you two are more alike than I thought you would be." That having been said, he teleported out leaving behind a shocked, awkward silence, and the smell of melted brimstone.

* * *

After explaining to the professor what had happened and receiving a detention that would help him make up his classes, he teleported out to the roof to relax for awhile in the darkness. He liked the darkness, people couldn't see him in the darkness. People couldn't be afraid of him then. As he was sitting on the roof looking out into space staring at nothing and listening to the silence, he noticed something moving out of the corner of his eye.

The tree closest to the Institute was rustling slightly, or at least he thought it was. There was no breeze so Kurt came to the conclusion that someone was sneaking out. Kurt had nothing else to do, so he decided to follow whoever it was sneaking out. He crept over to the edge of the roof and peered over being careful to stay in the shadows. At first, he thought he'd missed the perpetrator, but finally a shadow dropped from the tree and moved craftily towards the surrounding fence. Kurt knew to avoid teleporting since the "bamfing" sound it made tended to give him away. He, just as stealthily as the shadowy figure, jumped from the roof to the tree and carefully picked his way through the branches and dropped quietly to the ground. Again, he thought he'd lost the person, and once again the shadow appeared making it easy for him to follow.

The shadow had made it past the fence now and was making it's way to the surrounding woodsy area. At one point the shadow stopped and looked around her in a circle. Kurt was forced to bamf if he was going to stay hidden. By now, he could tell the shadow was a girl and he had a pretty good idea who the girl was. Then Kurt did lose the shadow girl. He spent five minutes trying to locate her, but she'd given him the slip, so he bamfed back to the institute. As he appeared at the doorstep, Logan opened the door.

"Where is she?" Logan growled, but underneath there was something more, concern perhaps?

"She vent that vay." Kurt said indicating which direction X23 had gone. He hadn't even needed to ask who Logan was talking about. Maybe she was more predictable than she thought, maybe.

* * *

X23 had been chilling in the room they'd let her use when she'd first sensed him. Thankfully they'd stuck her in a room by herself and not with some annoying roommate. She could handle being all by herself. As said, it was while sitting in the room so graciously bequeathed to her, okay so she was in a foul mood, what else was new, when she got chills up her spine. Only one could do that to her, and as far as she knew he was dead. Hoping to check things out without too much interference or property damage she opted for a search and destroy. Within seconds X23 was out the window and down the tree. One good thing could be said for HYDRA, they certainly did train her well.

She'd been aware of Kurt following her, though she had to give the blue boy credit. She had gone quite a ways past the fence before she'd realized he was tailing her. Now, a good while later, she had come to a clearing. She was coiled tight, ready to spring. The night had grown quiet. The only sound breaking the hush was the sound of her ragged intakes of breath. This was the part of battles that she both lived for and detested. This was a pivoting point where everything and anything could happen. This is where life and death really hangs in the balance. Where if you predict wrong from where your enemy would attack, the battle would be over before it even started. This was the only moment where your enemy could truly surprise you. She wished she wasn't so tense. She wished she wasn't so tense. She wished she wasn't breathing so harshly. If she wanted to be prepared for the first move, she really should be a lot calmer than she is. She couldn't calm down though because her mind was reeling. What was about to take place should not be possible.

The clinking whoosh of claws extending came from the bushes at the right and a shadow launched itself at X23. With viper-like reflexes X23 fell flat on her back and extended the claws in her feet and brought her legs up to catch the assailant in the midriff and launch them over her head to land face down in the dirt. She quickly got to her feet and whirled, claws in her hands whooshing out. She would be ready. The body on the ground began to shake uncontrollably. When the shadow raised its head, she realized it was laughing. Due to the timbre of the laugh it was obvious that the shadow was male. His laugh took on a maniacal pitch.

"23, you haven't changed at all. Good to know some things never change." Having said this he was on his feet, but X23 had already run off into the woods. This could not be happening. He was dead! If she wasn't hallucinating, she was in trouble.

* * *

Logan was about to commandeer Kurt to have him show Logan where X23 had gone when the girl in question came crashing through the front windows that had just been fixed, completely bloody and broken. She lay prone on the floor practically unconscious. Someone laughed from where they crouched in the window frame.

"I think you've lost your touch little 23." The masculine growl sent shivers down Logan's spine. That voice was his voice. The man who stepped down from the ledge was not a clone thankfully. Logan wasn't sure if he would have been able to handle that. They shared the same broad-jawed face with the same eyes that always seemed to glare out at the world. Logan's hair was longer, and the kid had no sideburns. Logan was taller than the stranger by a couple of inches but they still shared the same blocky build. The stranger was decked out in a black jumpsuit. Odd pads were arranged at his knees, elbows, and chest. He wore a strange pair of gloves that only covered his thumb and last fingers. His black boots made a soft thud as he crunched down on the broken glass that lay scattered across the floor. The man grinned. An eerie thing to see, like looking in the mirror only to find your reflection sticking its tongue out at you.

"Don't mind us, me an' X are jus gonna take a little trip down memory lane." He quipped as he grabbed X23 by the hair and jerked her to her feet dragging her back across the windowsill and into the night.

* * *

X23 had not only been jerked back to her feet by her hair but she chose that moment to also jerk back into consciousness. She let out a gargled yowl and began to ferociously struggle, as she was drug across the windowsill, which of course only resulted in her cutting herself multiple times in multiple places. Once across the windowsill the stranger threw her to the ground where she lay panting dazed and disoriented. She'd forgotten how hard he hit, how mean he was. She slowly gained her feet, but like he'd wanted, she'd given him the time he needed to hide. Hopefully, the same time could be used for her to heal.

Inside the mansion Logan had ordered Kurt to find the professor, and any of the other adults. Roger, whose room was closest to the commotion came sleepily down the stairs and immediately made a crack about the broken windows only to have Logan tell him to shut it. Then Logan ordered him to make sure that no one got hurt on all the broken glass. After he was done barking orders he moved for the door, only to be nearly impaled by a set of claws. When the claws retracted he noticed a strange burn mark was left on the wood. He would have taken more time to ponder it, but he could hear the fight moving away from the house. He whipped open the door and went running into the night.

X23 had been taken by surprise in round two of the fight. If she hadn't ducked at the last second, she would have been impaled instead of the door. She had to get him away from the school. She didn't need the obstacles of cluttered rooms and staircases to get in the way. When it came down to an out and out brawl, X23 preferred to be in a wide-open space. They were in a large grassy area a little ways past the Institute's backyard, but before the wooded area behind the house. Things were moving too quickly for her to really come up with a working plan, but that didn't matter. She was a creature of instinct, she was designed to be. The only problem was so was he.

"I find it interesting to find you hooked up with the man you sought to destroy." Great, here came the taunting.

"Why are you here Jared?" X23 called to the darkness finally giving a name to the face. It seemed his voice was coming from all direction, so tracking him by making talk was not going to work in this situation. Damn.

"Why do you think? You are one of HYDRA's projects and they have not finished with you yet. I see what they mean about the temper. You are to be taken back to see if you are salvageable, or exterminated if you are not." X23 gave a snort, then she gave what she would never admit was a giggle and finally burst into bitter laughter. She never did find out much else because he launched himself at her again. This time he was relentless, slicing and hacking what he could. Right as Logan and the others whom Kurt had notified arrived, Jared grabbed X23, shoved some kind of dart into her throat, and dropped her.

"Have a nice stroll down memory lane." He quipped again, his point being made. He turned and fled. Logan chased after the stranger, but didn't give much chase. X23 lay face down on the ground, eyes glazed as if she were dead, while a dark pool spread out beneath her, black glinting white in the moonlight.

* * *

The room was spinning wildly around her in shades of black and white and grey. She was drowning, gasping for breath and inhaling water instead. Just when she thought her life would expire, she cold breath again. However, by the time she got out of this tank, she would wish for death. The only thing she can associate with this time in her life is pain. Harsh, burning, throbbing pain that still pulses through her every time she extends her claws.

* * *

X23's pulse was spiking rapidly and everyone who'd gathered around her in the medical ward was getting worried if not panicked as rapidly as her heartbeat was increasing. Logan, Gambit, and Scott were trying to restrain X23 who'd begun to spasm violently and avoid getting stabbed at the same time.

"What did that bastard give her?" Logan snarled out. Storm had taken a sample from the dart and she and Hank had been trying to analyze what had been given to her, but so far no results matched anything that was in any known database.

"Let me try." Elijah suddenly appeared next to Storm, already knowing what the substance was. It had been hours since the injection had been given and they had nothing else to lose. He jacked into the computer and streams of data began to dance across the screen.

"Hmmm."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Hank asked nervously.

"He's changed it." Elijah could barely be heard. Storm and Hank exchanged glances. Storm ran out of patience first.

"Will you please tell me what is going on?" Elijah merely unplugged himself and ran back to where X23 was twisting and jerking on the medical table. She was still bleeding profusely, a fact that not been lost on Logan. Elijah shot her up with a sedative and the group gave a collective sigh of relief.

"Don't get too comfortable. I'd say that'll only hold her about, oh, five minutes or so."

"What the hell did that bastard give her?" Logan asked for a second time. "And why isn't she healing the way she's supposed to be?"

"He gave her a mixture of drugs that really have no name when combined. Think of it as being doped up on speed, meth, and acid all at once. Throw in a little codeine and you effectively have a way to keep her where you want her. This reaction she's had is only because it's been out of her system for so long. It was the only combination of drugs HYDRA could find that was guaranteed to knock them out long enough for some of the scientists to get some sleep. They kept them addicted so they wouldn't run away. You think this is bad now, wait until she hits withdrawal." Logan had gone very still. Every muscle in his body was drawn taut and hard. No wonder she had wanted to kill him. Right now, he couldn't say he blamed her.

"As to why she's still bleeding, well that's Jared's doing too. When he was put through the Weapon X process, something went wrong. He doesn't exactly heal properly and his body had a bad reaction to the whole thing. The metal inside his body and on his claws is still reacting and it creates a kind of acid that inhibits your naturally advanced healing processes. A fatal blow from him could actually be fatal for you. However, a fatal blow by you can also be just as deadly for him. His own acid could eat him from the inside out."

"Is there anything we can do for her?" Hank asked.

"Stay out of her way and make sure she can't bust out of this room." Elijah said with a shrug. Then he left followed slowly by everyone else. On the roof, Kurt could be heard praying.

* * *

"You weren't supposed to use the drugs." The large blocky figure growled with a thick Russian accent from the shadows. Two snake like coils sprang for the arrogant boy's head. For one instant it looked like they would actually connect, and then the boy was not there and the coils slammed into the wall showering brick fragments everywhere.

"And miss my chance to fuck with her head? No, I think my approach will work much better. Perhaps it will even scare her a little." The blocky figure just stood in the shadows.

"This would have been over earlier had you not interfered. I think you would be wise to never do so again. Now we wait."

"Aye, aye cap'n." The boy saluted cockily. He couldn't remember the last time that he felt this good. He almost felt like giggling.

The Russian man had left his two partners in crime and made his way to a pay phone.

"He's becoming a liability."

"I figured he would be." What should have been a sultry voice became a harsh ugly hiss. "However, the only way to get rid of him along with that girl is to keep him close. No more mistakes. Complete termination of this Genesis project is all that will be accepted. Nothing gets left behind, nothing."

"Yes ma'am."

"From now on you and Gauntlet run the show."

* * *

She was hunched in a corner of a room that seemed fuzzy at the edges, like an artist had rubbed all the lines, blurring them. Somewhere inside of her she knew this wasn't real. It was funny somehow, how much she'd managed to forget. She was crying, how she hated crying. It never accomplished anything. She'd been locked up for the night, and it was here that she hated the most. They were still watching her. She knew the cameras were there, knew that their cold, glassy eyes were fixated on her no matter where she moved.

Sometimes she felt like going crazy, just smashing everything to bits. She had the power, but they had the numbers. She'd tried to puzzle it out many times. She'd tried to manipulate the scenario every which way until all her thoughts were swirling aimlessly in the cesspool of her mind until she felt like her head would explode. Her thoughts were literally dizzying. To make matters worse, she was beginning to crave whatever it was they had given her. It got to be if she wasn't administered a hit at the end of the day she went crazy.

She hated them. If she ever made it out of here, she wasn't going to kill them. She was going to destroy them. She'd had only one reason so far for cooperation: she had no choice. As long as she was drugged, she was stuck here. She'd tried to find a way to avoid the injections, but so far nothing had worked. She'd gone a couple of times without the injection but the withdrawal seemed worse than the drug. To put it bluntly, she was screwed.

Time in her memories fast-forwarded. The endless drills and training sessions with no rewards and only punishment. Logan had finally entered into the equation and suddenly she had another reason to survive. She wanted to make him pay. Whenever she began to give in, whenever she began to break, she had only to think of him and let her rage take over. If she'd looked within herself she would have known it wasn't Logan she really hated. It was herself.

* * *

She came out of her drug-induced coma like a bullet snarling and ready to tear up anything that was in her way. Thankfully, Logan had anticipated this and had moved away from the table. This time his war wounds consisted of a couple of scratches on his chest. She was drenched in sweat and her breath came in harsh, spastic gasps. She fell off the edged of the medical table and vomited. Clutching the edged of the table she crouched with her head on her knees.

"Please, just leave me alone." She whispered on a strangled sob. Without a word being said, Logan left, quietly closing the door behind him.


	11. Past Acquaintance

Disclaimer: I don't own X-Men. I wish I did. sigh

A/N: Here's a fun little side story that I wrote. THIS IS NOT A PAIRING!!!!!! So all you Romy fans don't smack me. I can see how you think this could be a pairing but it's not. trust me. And if you didn't think it was a pairing, well then...um...just ignore that.

Also, forgive my poor attempts at Gambit's accent. I have a very bare bones outline for it, and I really hate writing accents, but I am trying so be nice, or better yet, be helpful. By the way, I keep seeing people writing it chere, but I take French and I have never seen this word. So I'm going with my proper French unless people start beating me. So unless people in New Orleans have a weird way of writing the word, I refuse to change it.

I also hope people are able to follow my flashback type things. If you can't lemme know and I'll see what I can do about it. I just think it should be obvious as to what's going on when, but then again I am writing it.

**Episodic**: Thanks bunches for the idea. Hope you like it.

**Curliest Guru:** :)

**Chapter 11: Past Acquaintance**

X23 sat crouched in a corner half naked and sweating. For a day and a half she'd had visions of worms slowly ripping their way through her flesh. She was pretty grateful that phase of her with-drawl was over. She'd always hated that effect of the drug. Now she just couldn't stop shaking and she was so terribly hot. Her skin was dry and almost leathery. She felt that if her temperature increased anymore she'd spontaneously combust. It was so hard to keep her eyes open, but she didn't want to close her eyes for fear that she may never open them again.

"You look terrible, cherie." Gambit smirked from the doorway. X23 groaned, she'd always found his Cajun accent annoying rather than sexy like so many other vapid women. She struggled to turn her head towards the sound of his voice. Gambit, as always, immediately realizing the problem moved further into the room and sat on the medical table, legs dangling like a little kid. She assumed he found himself quite attractive with his skin tight black T-shirt and black pants. He wore combat boots similar to her own. She couldn't help looking into his unusual red eyes trying to decipher what he was thinking in this moment. Scratch that, she probably didn't want to know. He'd probably spent the whole time finishing undressing her in his mind. He cocked his head as though he were listening to something and asked her guardedly, "Do you remember me? I sure remember you."

"I hope you remember me kicking your ass." Gambit grimaced. He wished she wouldn't talk so loudly. After all, he had a reputation to protect here.

"I remember."

"It was your own fault."

"Here I thought pretty women liked havin' a dashin' knight in shinin' armor come to de rescue." If she had the strength she would have rolled her eyes at him. She settled for resting her head on her arms instead. Gambit stared at her. She was pretty, in an exotic, dangerous sort of way when she wasn't beating the crap out of you. She was like a Venus Fly Trap, dangerous but pretty in its own carnal sort of way. At his disgruntled grumbling she may have given a small smile or a grimace of pain. She closed her eyes, just for a moment.

* * *

It had been poor pickings ever for a seasoned thief such as himself. He was pretty tired. It wasn't always easy being a pickpocket, but he owed some people some money, and these were definitely people to whom you repaid your debts. He was in some city, it was sad that he didn't even know which one, and he didn't care. No city compared to his home, New Orleans, and since he wasn't pulling a big heist, his location wasn't important. If he was forced to stake his like on a guess he'd have said somewhere near Chicago.

From out of the corner of his eye he caught a flash of color. It was a hooker bedecked in a bright red boa and not much else. Normally, he may have engaged in a conversation, definitely would have flirted. Hookers were brazenly obvious and they could be an amusing distraction sometimes, but tonight he still had business to attend to. He was walking down the sidewalk when the same feathered hooker rushed past him obviously frightened.

He knew he was going to do it before he had turned and found himself at the mouth of the alleyway. The opportunity was just too good to pass up. He loved playing hero to the damsel in distress. At the end of the alleyway a small dark shadow was being harassed by two larger black shadows. He was just in time to see the smaller shadow shoved to the ground with one of the larger shadows on top. Gambit immediately sprang into action, cards in his hand, charged and flying in the blink of an eye. None of the cards hit anyone. He'd aimed to miss.

The larger shadow that wasn't occupied by the hooker turned, but Gambit was ready.

"I suggest you leave de fille alone." He drawled lazily. The larger shadow wasn't very smart because he charged Gambit only to find himself on his back up against the wall, dazed and confused. The other shadow shoved the girl into the wall as well and she fell heavily to the ground. Within seconds the second large shadow was taken care of. With a cocky grin he turned to use his charms on whomever he had just saved only to have a very solid fist connect very solidly with his jaw. Although he'd never admit it, he saw stars.

"What the hell is your problem? You have shit for brains?" He looked up into flashing green eyes that seemed to shine out from pale, luminous skin that shone like alabaster in the moonlight. Her dark hair floated bewitchingly around her face. This one would not have any problem reeling in the customers. Dark purple bruises mellowed and faded before his eyes. He heard the sound of blades being drawn and immediately snapped to attention. Claws that extended from the girl's hands confronted him.

"Merde, I attacked the wrong party."

"Fuck, you chased away the only business I've had all evening. You owe me for my two customers."

"But dey—" It suddenly dawned on him what had been transpiring. With a twisted grin like that of a death mask on her face she leaned in close and whispered, "You wouldn't believe how much money people are willing to spend to have me sink them into them." If he had been anyone else, anyone who hadn't seen half the things he had, he would have run screaming into the night. Instead he looked away, sorry he'd cost her some business for the night.

A hand came into his view and he was on his feet in an instant. The just shook her head and started to climb over some boxes. "C'mon, you can buy me dinner. I know a place that has some really great noodles." She shot a look over her shoulder, "Are you coming or not? I can find other ways of making you pay that would be much more entertaining for me." She said flexing her hands making her indications clear. Gambit figured it would be best to follow.

They entered the restaurant together. The interior was dimly lit; each table having only enough light to barley illuminated the cracked Formica that made up the tabletops. None of the chairs matched any of the tables, and there was enough smoke floating around to kill someone with lung cancer within five minutes. However, she was right. They had some pretty damn good noodles. He watched her as she slurped noodles out of the bowl with a child like delight that he knew few others probably ever got to see. After awhile, she sighed and said, "Let's see, two paying customers gone, plus a bad night equals one very unhappy boss."

"What do you propose I do about dat? I'm already payin' for de meal, but I can't make up for your customers." She jerked her head as though snapping out of a daydream.

"I wasn't suggesting that you should have to make up for them, just thinking out loud." She sighed again. It was clear that she was going to be in trouble. The problem Gambit was having was he couldn't tell if she was laying on the guilt, or just in general worrying.

After several bowls of noodles she finally seemed to have eaten her fill, something she must not have been able to do in awhile, they left the restaurant. They hadn't really spoken much, but they seemed to be comfortable just knowing the other one was there. Knowing that for a little while, neither one of them had to be alone. It was a surreal experience for both of them. It had begun to rain while they had eaten and she shivered a little as the first fat drops dampened her skin. Something settled around her shoulder encompassing her with warmth. She looked up, eyes contracting in surprise, but he was already gone. She put her hands in the pockets and proceeded to walk down the sidewalk in the opposite direction. Her fingers brushed the bills that filled the pockets, glad that the rain would hide her tears of relief.

* * *

Blood trickled down her forehead and colored her vision red. She sat on her heels, back spooned over the floor in a subservient position. She bit her lip. She could handle pain. It was what she was paid for. She kneeled before a large, solid man. His presence was dominating and he let everyone know that he was in charge. His hair was cut in the latest style, his clothes were of the finest cut. He was a businessman and his business happened to be whores. Today he wore a red suit. He wore a lot of red. It hid the blood. He'd shed the blazer and had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His thick, meaty arms straining to be set free of the fabric. He was leisurely smoking a cigar.

"You aren't paid to take men out to dinner. What am I going to do with you? You didn't even bring in half as much money as Lucy, but you've had three more customers than she has. Fail me again and measures will be taken." She visibly began to tremble. The thing about the money wasn't true. She made more money than anyone else did in this hellhole. Her boss was predictable and he wasn't any different than the scientists at HYDRA. She could feel herself getting angry, but if she let it show they wouldn't leave her alone.

"I'll do better. I promise." She whispered. She was dismissed and made her way to the room provided for her, if you could call it a room. It was dark, there wasn't even a light. Why waste electricity on whores? She was grateful for her good night vision. She had a single, dirty mattress on the floor. The walls were dingy, the floor was dirty, and the one little window in the corner had no covering of any kind. The only thing that the boss spent money lavishly on was the clothes his girls wore. She hated this place and was still cursing herself for ending up in this situation. She'd been on the run from HYDRA for only about a month when she'd been attacked. She had still been suffering from with drawl and malnutrition, so she'd been too weak to fend the attackers off. When the boss sow her claws and healing factor in action he'd immediately come up with a use for her.

She took off her "costume" and slowly cleaned her sore body in a lukewarm shower. After about 5 minutes what little heat there had been was lost and the water turned ice cold. She turned off the shower and plugged the drain letting the tub fill to the brim. She submerged herself letting the cold, cold water flood over head and spill over the lip of the tub and onto the floor. Underneath the water she couldn't hear anything, not even the sound of her heart. The cold seeped into her skin. Once again, she was numb. She only survived by being numb. People in her profession had to be. They were soulless, sinful creatures good enough to fuck at night but not good for much else. She burst above the water with a gasp spraying water everywhere. She stood up and let the water drain out of the tub.

_Drip, drip, drip..._

She stared at her face in the mirror. It was perfect, whole.

_Drip...drip...drip..._

She wished she could tear it up. She wanted to strip the flesh from her face. She wanted to tear her hair out and gouge out her eyes.

_Drip...dri...drip._

She extended her claws and slashed one across her wrist. As the few drops of blood welled up so did her tears. That's the problem with being a regenerative. You had a hell of a time trying to kill yourself. She sprawled on the floor, naked, cold, and crying.


	12. Jared

Hi guys! I might actually have this posted before Thanksgiving, but that was my goal. Isn't homework a bitch? I don't know if I need to up my rating yet or not...but I'll see if I decide to get too creepy like. Whatever. By the way, this is the first chapter that I've just sat down at my computer and typed out. Normally I will write out most of my chapter before I ever type it. I know it's a lot more work, but it is easier for me. So let me know if you find it an improvement or no difference or whatever.

**Episodic:** : )

**Curliest Guru:** Grammar sucks, don't it?? : )

**LolitaRed:** Keep up the good work. I look forward to your reviews! : )

God Damn! If I don't stop hitting the control key instead of shift....

Disclaimer: I don't own. Don't sue. I have connections, so it wouldn't even be worth it. I do own Jared and...um...wow, shows how near and dear my oc are to me. :P

**Chapter 12: Jared**

The water from the showerhead pounded onto her bent head. Her hair grew heavy with the weight of the water. The pressure forced her head down, and she let the scalding water snake across her skin. Rivulets streamed down her back and curled around her legs before they were swept away to join the flowing tide down the drain. She had her upper body braced against the wall. It almost looked like she was trying to hold the wall up. With her in a lunge position, and her head bowed, she looked the epitome of defeat. It had been a long time since she felt this drained. She didn't like it. Her legs were already shaking and she'd only been standing for about an hour. This was not good. The water continued to pound down on her head, as if it were trying to drive her skull into the bottom of the white porcelain tub. She started to sink down then grew very tense. She refused to let this happen. She refused to be weak.

Her whole body was wrought with tension. Her arms and legs were vibrating with it. She stared at her distorted reflection in the spigot of the tub and growled at it. She was a mess and she knew it, and she knew that everyone else knew it. Crap. Her mind was still running in circles. When she'd first stepped into the shower she'd stood for nearly ten minutes just watching the water spiral down into the deep, dark, nothingness of the drainpipe. She'd wanted to melt into water herself and just follow the water, spiraling down forever. She began to shake. This really wasn't good. She really didn't like water. Even if she was only taking a shower. Her head shot up and with a flip of her wrists the water spluttered to a stop. Within seconds the bathroom stood eerily silent, steamy, and empty. The door banging on the opposite wall was the only clue that someone had just recently been in there at all.

* * *

Shadows slipped from the darkness to converge into mass pools of shadow that slipped back into darkness. Quickly, but quietly, they made their way to the dimly lit house that sat atop the hill. There was little cover for them to hide behind. They didn't like that at all. With their own private arsenals strapped to every shadows back, it was amazing that any of them could move at all. Suddenly, they were running at what seemed faster than normal, but whatever advantage they had was too slight to be seen by the untrained eye. They quickly spread out to surround the house and to press their backs to the walls away from windows so as to gain cover and not be seen. At their leaders insistence they began a quiet sweep of the house.

One shadow broke loose from the groups and made its way down a hallway. It'd thought it had heard something. The hardwood floor made it difficult for it to walk quietly. It's large combat boots made a lot of noise. So did some of the straps that held its arsenal in place. The green plated facemask it wore was hot and itchy. It wanted to take it off, but if they had to throw anything that emitted fumes, it would come in handy, if it were wearing the mask. A sound from above sent him spinning desperately searching for the source of the noise.

"They really ought to teach you to look up." A cynical voice drawled from the crouch where the attacker had landed at their victim's feet.

* * *

X23 was cold. On top of that she was nervous. She wasn't nervous about the people who had slipped into the school unnoticed. No, she had expected that. What made her nervous was running around the mansion in her skivvies. It wasn't that she was ashamed of her body, though there were plenty of parts she didn't like, she just didn't like being that vulnerable. Plus, if anyone caught her she could imagine what the repercussions would be. The thought stopped her cold in her tracks. _When did I start to care what these people think? When did I start striving to please them?_ Fuck. She did not break out of Viper's prison just to be roped into another one. The thought made her angry. Good. She could use some anger right about now. In fact, she could do with a nice bout of rage.

She had opened the bathroom door more forcefully than necessary so as to draw attention to it. Sure enough, a willing trooper had taken the bait. He looked like a storm trooper, only in black instead of white, and not so plasticine. He was a rookie. She could tell. He didn't carry enough weapons to warrant a higher rank, and he came to investigate all by his lonesome. She nearly laughed. The one thing that never failed her: people never, ever looked up. All she had to do was flop, rather ungracefully, on top of him and he was down for the count. After taunting an unconscious body, she stripped the soldier of his clothes and made her way off. She opted to go barefoot; it was quieter that way.

She came to the room of a young girl. The girl's mousy brown hair was made even more unruly by bed head, and the simple nightgown she wore seemed to make her shapeless in the bed. Her pale freckled face offset her wide frightened eyes. She'd taken note of this girl because X23 had noticed that she had a very interesting power. She covered the girl's mouth and quickly instructed the girl, "Don't scream. At least not yet." After several seconds of calming the girl she had to convince her to cooperate in this plan. After assuring herself that the girl would be useful and not make things more difficult she headed down the hall. She only had about five minutes before the young girl complied with her wishes.

X23 didn't even bother to hide her tracks, or muffle any noise she might make because she wanted them to follow her, and follow her they did. Like a bizarre pied piper, she led them to the center of the house. She just hoped she knew what she was doing. Too bad, she hardly ever knew what she was really getting herself mixed up in. At the landing she drawled sarcastically to all that could hear.

"Don't you boys ever learn?" Like in comedies, where all the masses look as one to the sky to see the boulder about to smash them, the soldiers drew their attention to the landing she was crouched upon. With that she launched herself upon them. Letting the mass killing spree begin.

* * *

Jared paced in the clearing just near the woods. She would be here. He knew it. He knew her. She was so predictable and yet, she still always managed to surprise him. Like her being here for instance, living next to a man she despised. Had she gone daft? It was the only explanation that he could come up with. She had completely lost her marbles this time. Jared flopped back onto the soft, cool grass and stared and the blackness that made up the sky. He figured he'd have some time to kill. X23 was to him what Logan was to her. He hated her...and yet...he didn't. Not really. That had been bugging him. He hadn't realized it until he saw her again, so different than the last time. She'd been just a kid them, helpless and pathetic like himself. Now, she was an angry lioness, with a roar every bit as bad as her bite, or her claws as the case may be.

He had hunted her before. Mostly because he'd been just as shocked as she to find another like himself still alive, and not at HYDRA. He dreamed about her sometimes. That really bothered him because in all the dreams he had of her she was crying. Only he could never see her face. Sometimes he'd get a flash of her angry green eyes hidden behind the curtain of her long black hair, but never the whole thing at once. He hated that face. He had to merely look in the mirror to see it for it was his own. He jumped up from the forest floor and began pacing again. He didn't want to psychoanalyze himself. He stabbed his claws into a nearby tree watching the wood nearest the claws warp and wither as the acid that covered his claws worked its way down to the heart of the tree. It would be dead by morning.

"And they say we need anger management." Just like that, she was there propped up against a tree. She was wearing one of the soldiers' uniforms, and she was barefoot. It was too big for her, and she'd only zipped it part way so that it was clear she was naked underneath. That bothered him too. Why was she bothering him this much? He'd wanted her to come, and now that she was here, he wanted her to leave him alone. He glared at her and was met with the same look mirrored back at him in her own eyes. What made her so special?

* * *

She'd felt him out in the woods while she'd been waiting for the soldiers to attack. As clear as day she could almost feel him calling her name. It way freaked her out so that she forgot about her plan. Suddenly the night was broken by a high pitched scream, like a banshee bringing death. X23 stood still and opted to let her eardrums burst rather than cover her ears and lose her advantage. It hurt like a son of a bitch, but she needed the time to get passed the soldiers while they were curled up on the floor in fetal positions. Plus, hopefully by this point everyone else was awake in the house and could take care of the poor soldiers lying on the mansion's foyer floor. She was out the door and running.

* * *

Rogue jerked awake in her bed. She hated being jerked awake, but she didn't really have time to process what was going on. She immediately clapped her hands on her ears and ran for the door. Since she had her eyes squeezed shut as well, she ran straight into a wall. She moved a hand to rub her head and immediately wished she hadn't.

"Oh god, it's happenin again!" She moaned to herself. The soldiers from the White House had to be back. They were trying to take them in for experimentation again. She hated to admit it but she was desperately terrified.

"Rogue, c'mon, let's go! We've got to get out of her." Bobby was by her side, trying to pry her hands of her ears. She realized who it was and tentatively moved a finger. The screaming had stopped. The professor needs us to round up the students. Just like last time, only we need to stay in the tunnels instead of completely leaving the property. Rogue nodded and sprung into action. She and Bobby split up making sure they herded all of the younger children on this level towards the secret passage. Some of the youngest had to be carried because they were either too scared or too tired to walk fast enough. Downstairs they could hear Scott and Storm doing the same.

Logan had been jerked awake by that damned girl again, and he was glad. There were people in the house. How had he missed that? He must be getting lazy, or old. Neither thought was one he relished. He'd never felt his age before, but that was before he knew he had offspring. That fact alone can give you grey hairs. Speaking of offspring, where was she? He made his way out and found a group of soldiers trying to get up. They appeared drunk. Some had blood gushing from where their ears would be underneath their masks. Logan extended his claws and got to work.

* * *

"Nice wake up call." Jared commented as he slowly extracted his claws from the tree.

"What do you want Jared. You didn't drag me all the way out here just to fuck with my head. You already had your fun so get to the point already." He tried to keep his face still. It still shocked him, her bluntness, her unabashed way of stating the truth and not showing any consideration towards whomever she was speaking to. Yet, something still showed in her eyes. It was bothering him. He really wanted it to stop bothering him. Without warning he charged at her. She had been surprised by his speed and hadn't had time to brace for the impact. He slammed her against the tree. He thrust her arms into a pin that he knew she couldn't get out of and immediately put all of his weight in his legs so that she couldn't move the feet he was standing on. His face was inches from hers and he was breathing shallowly. He hated her so much he thought he would choke.

X23 stared at his cheek, inches from her eyeball in shock. She'd never been this careless around anyone, especially Jared. Jared was crazy. He had it stuck in his head, that somehow she had stolen glory that rightfully belonged to him. Like she had wanted to be HYDRA's pet. That quick of anger let her realize that she hadn't fought when he'd slammed her head into the tree. Her recently healed ears began to throb again and the pain helped the anger grow. She tried to fight him, but he'd already covered his bases and she was in a vise like steal and she couldn't move. She was pissed. She wanted to rip his face off. The thought gave her idea and she smiled. If Jared had been paying attention, he would have feared what he saw on her face.

Jared let out a scream that should come from no man's throat as her teeth sank into the meatiest part of his nose so conveniently placed inches from her mouth. Like anyone would react he let her go and grabbed his face. As soon as his hands touched his face he was immediately groaning. He'd just made a rookie mistake. He could kick himself for it later. Now he had about 180 pounds of angry female launching herself at him and dragging him to the ground. It wasn't as sexy as it sounds. She was attempting to twist his spine in two. It wasn't going to work. He bucked her off of him and threw her into another tree.

"You bitch! Why couldn't you have left everything alone? You ruined everything!" His face was beginning to darken with rage. X23 tried to raise herself drunkenly to her feet.

"How did I ruin everything?" She screamed right back at him. It only made the pounding in her head beat all the louder.

"All I ever had to hear about was how they had managed to save you. How much progress you were making and what a failure I was. Then when you broke out, it still was about you. About how they couldn't wait to have you back, about how they lived for the day they could control you and destroy me." He spit every word at her like bullets. Every one hit their mark.

"You think I like being the star student of HYDRA you stupid bastard? You want their approval don't you. You sorry son of a bitch. You're nothing but a big baby." At this point she began to laugh her cold, cruel laugh that was devoid of humor. "So what are you going to do now that your precious HYDRA has failed you?"

"I want to destroy them, and you're going to help me do it." She stopped laughing. That wasn't funny. That wasn't funny at all.

* * *

The professor had given the all clear and most of the students had filed back into bed. Logan surveyed the damage.

"Pretty mild compared to our last couple of rumbles." He turned at the sound of her voice.

"And where were you for this one?" He raised an eyebrow at her appearance. The suit that was too big for her and the leaves stuck in her hair. She grimaced tiredly to herself and said the only clever response she could come up with, "In the shower." With that she made her way to the room they were letting her use and collapsed into bed. She had a lot of planning to do come morning.

* * *

I know it's kind of short, but it really actually sets up the next chapter quite nicely if I do say so myself.

It has occurred to me that some people may not understand what this little blue box at they bottom of the screen that says "Submit Review, Go" means. So I'm here to give you some quick easy instructions on how this works.

First, click on the little blue button that says "go", wait for the screen to pop up.

If you have a screen name and you feel like signing in if you haven't already done so, go ahead and do that now. If not, either leave the name blank or right something oh so clever in there and move on.

Now leave a very warm and loving response to the story you have just finished reading. Tell the author how wonderful it was and how you would love for them to continue writing so they don't have to go kill themselves when nobody talks to them. Or, if you find it amusing tell them that they are dumber than dirt.

Now, submit your review, so that the author knows you care.

This has been Reviews for Dummies, thank you and good (morning, mid morning, afternoon, mid day, evening, mid evening, night, midnight, time of day)


	13. Daddy's Little Girl

Hi guys! Hopefully by the time I get this posted it will be by my deadline I've set of December 1. Although you know what they say about deadlines....they love to go whooshing by. Oh, and forgive me if some stuff ends up really bitter. I am being dragged down to Alabama for Thanksgiving. No offense to anyone from Alabama. I reserve judgment. No, I just don't like my cousins much.

**Episodic:** I would just like to say that I have considered your suggestion of Max for her name and have, now don't take this the wrong way, rejected it. Mostly because I feel I would start stealingDark Angel's personality. God I miss that show! I have heard that they may be bringing it back. (but ya didn't hear it from me.) For right now I think I'll stick with X. It's like, when you find out Logan actually has a name. It's just not the same anymore. Anyway. I think I would like to remind you that you were going to make Christmas presents for your loyal reviewers myself included. You can never start too soon. : ) Thanks for all the reviews. I'll try to make this chapter a good one. Oh and I stole your little blurb about X23 hope ya don't mind cuz you get x23 and logan bonding.

**Curliest Guru:** HAPPY BIRTHDAY! WOO BIG 15? crap I don't even remember how old you are. lol naw, I'm kidding. way to go, you are no longer such a little kid! woo! oh and just because you'll know what I'm talking about, you delta minus semi-moron! I love you. hope you got lots of neat stuff and thanks for the reviews. one of these days maybe I'll sit down and actually get you to watch x-men.

**Lolita Red:** Feel better soon! And look just in time a new chapter for you to review! oh and I meant to tell you, James was soooooo sweet. mayhap a relationship will blossom? oh well. like I said feel better and thanks for the reviews. Now I feel bad that my message to you isn't as long. That's probably a good thing.

**Linnea's Muse: **You are so sweet. Thanks for the review. You are my saving grace. One of them anyway. Did that sound corny? and I don't mind long reviews. they are always welcome. Better than no review at all.

Ah my little fanfiction family. I hope y'all like it.

**Chapter 13: Daddy's Little Girl**

Something big was about to happen. X23 could feel it. It was like having a large stone pressing down on your chest, always pressing down making it difficult to breathe. The first time she'd ever felt something she'd panicked. She couldn't get enough air into her body. She lay on a bed in the dark. Everything important in her life had always happened at night, so it was no surprise that something was going to happen now. For once the whole institute slept. An anomaly from what she could gather. Logan hadn't said much since her conversation with Jared. She didn't understand that the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach was guilt. She sighed. No point in sitting in bed if she wasn't going to be sleeping.

In her purple plaid flannel pajama pants and her black long sleeve T-shirt. She padded her way down to the kitchen in her bare feet. Her metabolism made it so she needed to eat almost constantly. Sometimes it was annoying. Tonight she didn't mind the distraction. She dug into a half-pint of mint chocolate chip ice cream and contemplated everything that had transpired recently. She groaned and rested her forehead on her arms.

"You cryin again, petite?" X23 jerked up and extended her claws, all of them. It was just reflex.

"Damn it Gambit don't you ever make any noise?" She continued to mumble curses under her breath while simultaneously pulling out a chair for him to gracefully, and noiselessly lower himself into. He wasn't wearing his duster for once. Somehow it made him seem more real to her, sitting there in black leather pants, and a very skin tight black T-shirt that showed off every muscle. Without the coat, she paid more attention to his face, to him. His read eyes were captivating. Too captivating for anyone of the female variety's own good. X23 didn't have to worry. She had balls of steel.

"Now, don take dis the wrong way, but dat just be disturbing t' look at." Gambit jerked his chin towards her feet. X23 had forgotten to extract those claws when she relaxed. She hid a small smile, the only kind she was capable of giving, and sighed. "To be honest, they kind of hurt keeping them crammed up inside my feet all of the time. I know it's weird looking, hell even I think so, but damn it, it's just more comfortable." Gambit chuckled.

"Why X23 I think you be warming up to Remey." X23 rolled her eyes.

"Gambit I've got to give you credit, you are something that can always be counted on to never change." Gambit sobered up a little at that remark, all kinds of emotions played across his face that she knew he tried to hide. X23 sobered too. "See, I just go and ruin everything don't I?" Gambit hated himself as much as she hated who she was.

"I'm just glad to see you no longer on the streets. It's not de best place to be, non?" He cocked and eyebrow at her pointedly. Was everyone going to try and play dad to her? "How did you manage to get out of dat? I think I deserve ta hear de story." X23 heaved a huge sigh. She was being dramatic, but with Remey it didn't matter. There was something freeing about being around him. Almost like you'd be willing to let everything go and just have a good time. It was something she valued in these few moments she'd been around him but something she was wary of too. "The boss owed me a favor, and I made him an offer that he just couldn't refuse."

"And what kind of offer would dat be?" X23 extended the claws in one hand again pointedly and replied, "I threatened to cut off the mother fucker's balls if he ever touched me or let anyone else touch me again." Gambit let out a loud, long laugh.

"Cherie, you really are sometin else. I bet he let you do whatever you wanted after that."

"Oh yeah, he set me up real nice. I doubt I'll ever have to make money again."

* * *

Logan stood just outside the kitchen and listened. X23 must not be paying the normal amount of attention she paid to her surroundings otherwise she would've said something. Either that or she was pointedly ignoring him. A sharp stabbing pain seared through his chest at that. He looked at Gambit, so easily talking to his daughter, and felt a bubbling kind of anger that he hadn't felt since Jean picked Scott over him. He would never admit it, but in that moment he was jealous of Gambit. Jealous of the fact that Gambit knew her, that he could talk to her; that Gambit could make that cold half smile of hers grace her lips. And then Logan was angry, angry at himself, angry at her. Why couldn't he ever just have peace in his life? Damn it, she'd only been here a short time and fuck him to hell, he already cared.

* * *

X23 and Gambit had jumped when the door had slammed. She all the way up from the table claws extended already sniffing the air, Gambit jerking to a more alert position, three cards casually out and loose in his hands. X23 was confused. She didn't smell anyone different or strange, just Logan. She sniffed again, drawing more of her surroundings smells inside herself, analyzing them in a very systematic way. It was then that she noticed it, the unmistakable tang of anger and fear. Surprisingly enough, the two seemed to always go together. She looked at Gambit.

"Well I think I've had all the fun I can handle for one night." She offered him a small shake of her head when he looked at her with concern.

"Aww petite, de fun hasn't even started yet." She offered him a mean glare that believe it or not scared the crap out of him. He forgot that she wasn't always quick on the uptake when it came to some social situations, especially flirting. Though considering her past profession he didn't blame her. He grabbed at his chest above his heart, "Doomed ta be forever rejected by the wild rose." Now she rolled her eyes at him, but at least some of that anger, and the underlying sadness she wouldn't admit to, wasn't as prominent as it had been before.

"G'night X, as always, it's been a pleasure cherie." With that he swept out of the room. Several seconds later she heard the sound of his motorcycle roaring to life to drone up the street and eventually, silence. She sighed then smiled. Like she said, she could always count on Gambit to be Gambit. Interesting that she'd known him so briefly and yet, she seemed to be able to bond so well with him. Great. She needed a friend. She put the ice cream away and steeled herself. Then she went out into the cold night air in search of Logan.

* * *

Logan hacked his way through the woods. Nothing like cutting down trees for your anger management. He stopped. He smelled something strange. Anger, with a tinge of dementia craze seemed to permeate the whole clearing that he was standing in. Underneath it all, he smelled something else. It was harder to place because it smelled like himself. It was X23's scent. Now that he'd been around her he had picked up on some subtle differences between her scent and his own. She had been here with Jared. For some reason that fact seemed to piss him off more, mostly because there weren't many signs of major struggle. He whirled around, thinking he might have heard something.

X23 emerged from behind some trees. She still reminded him of a ghost, pale as she was and as silently as she moved. All kinds of emotions that Logan didn't know how to deal with bubbled to the surface so he worked with the one he was most comfortable with: anger.

"Fine time for a stroll. I didn't peg you for the type to commune with nature." X23 had tried to lighten the situation, but it didn't help. The awful feeling in the pit of her stomach, dread and guilt churned together was back. Her fight or flight programming was kicking in and she desperately fought her uprising panic.

"What was Jared doing here?" He demanded sounding very much the condescending parent. X23 found her own anger and fought back.

"Why do you care. Maybe he just wanted to drop by and have a chat."

"What's this you were talking to Gambit about? What kind of disgraceful life were you living."

"If you must know, after I escaped from HYDRA I was a whore for awhile. It was the only thing I could make a decent living at." She spat back at him. Both were short of extending their claws, but amazingly that reaction was kept in check. Then Logan turned hateful.

"You come waltzing in here and you think you're so tough don't you, so god damn untouchable. The only thing you've got is them claws of yours and let me tell you, without them, you're nothing. Nothing and nobody! You are so screwed up you don't know left from right and you think you can run around threatening people into doing whatever the hell you want. You're so scared of letting anyone see anything about you. So you traumatize people instead. But let me tell you something, that isn't going to fly well around here. You think you can act like this for the rest of your life, like you don't need anybody? You are going to look around you someday and you are going to realize how utterly alone you are and then where are you going to be?" He screamed all the pain and rage he subjected himself to everyday. Every word sliced through X23 more painfully than anything else she'd ever been cut by before. She wasn't the only one who was mentally fucked up around here.

"I pose again the question of why the fuck do you care?" She choked back a sob. "You think I'm nothing, look in the mirror you fucked up bastard. At least I don't deny what I am, a freak and a social reject. You come out here and scream at me and then wonder why I don't like people, why I drive them away. Yeah, you've been real warm and fuzzy like. You fucking hypocrite. Fuck you I don't need this. I could've stayed at HYDRA to suffer this kind of abuse. You think I'm nothing, yeah, that may be, but at least I'm a nothing with a purpose. What are you Weapon X? What? You're a drifter that has to destroy everything you touch because that was what you were made to do like me: destroy things. We are made to fuck up everyone's lives." She screamed all of it, spitting every hateful word into his face. He was so shocked by the depth of her rage, deeper than his, that he didn't even stop her when she began to pound on his chest. He also hazely thought it was surprising that no one had come to see what all of the commotion was. By now, tears were streaming down X23's face she was so pissed of, and somewhere deep down, heartbroken.

X23 had enough and angrily jerked away striding through the woods. Logan caught her arm as she extended it behind her head to extend her middle finger at him.

"X, I'm sorry, I did—"

"FUCK YOU! How many times to I have to scream it in your face that I don't give a damn about what you think. I don't want your fucking apologies and I certainly don't need your pity. I should've killed you when I had the chance."

"Damn it stop!"

"Why? It's a fine time you picked to start playing dad." She sneered into his face. Logan however, wouldn't let her leave just yet. Suddenly she dropped to the ground, one leg extended claws popping out. "Let me go, or we find out if they gave you adamantine balls too." She growled. He moved back and let her stand. When he reached for her, she swatted his hand away and angrily stalked away.

Logan sat on the ground and put his head on his knees. He let out a strangled sob. None of that had come out the way he wanted it to. He wanted to pick her up and shake her. He wanted to hug her until she finally let herself be. He didn't want to care, but he did. He really was fucked. Tears poured down his face. He didn't know how to do this. He didn't want to have to do this. He wished this wasn't happening. He wished what she'd thrown in his face wasn't true.

"I just...I just don't want you to end up like me." He whispered into the cold, cold night.

* * *

X23 made it to her room and slammed the door. She didn't care if she woke somebody up. Fuck them. She leaned against the door, eyes closed. An unmistakable change came over her. One that had been seen before by people who were no longer alive. When she opened her eyes they were a cold and smoky green, like old glass bottles. The rage in them was deeper than any anyone had yet to see.

"I have something you might like." Elijah's small voice piped up from the bed. She looked at him with her dead eyes and then to the bed where his "present" lay. She made a facial expression that made Elijah shiver. She walked over to the bed and picked up what was on it, her old uniform.

"I forget, you know everything." Her voice was like icicles jabbing there way through your spine and out your stomach. The next morning, for the second time, X23 was gone. Logan and Elijah were the only two that weren't surprised.

A/N: I would just like to remind people that I am NOT, I repeat NOT pairing X23 and Gambit. I just think she can use all the friends she can get. Episodic, hope you like it, not exactly the "bonding" you were looking for, but believe me, it's a small step towards a beautiful thing. Hope I captured the angst of being a parent with a "difficult" child. Why is it I set these deadlines and then immediately go ahead and do what I said I'd do right after I give myself plenty of time to do it? Did that make sense? Oh well.

Oh and I really like to use the word fuck. I just kind of noticed it. I know I say it a lot, but I didn't realize I made X23 say it so much. ok, well, it's like 10:30 time for David Letterman. Night peeps, hope ya liked it.

REMEMBER TO REVIEW FOR THE SAKE OF THE SANITY OF THE AUTHOR.

OH AND HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ONE AND ALL. REMEMBER TO BE THANKFUL FOR SOMETHING. I AM THANKFUL FOR ALL OF MY FANFICTION FRIENDS.


	14. Let the Games Begin

Hi guys, long time no see er…whatever. Anyway, I just really wanted to extend my gratitude to all the people that read my fic. I'd do individual thanks, but um…it's been so long since I've seen who's written what that I'll just extend and general great big THANK YOU to everyone. So THANKS!!!!

HAPPY B-DAY TO ME! I TURNED 17 ON JANUARY 7! WOOOO!

Now, onto the story.

Oh, and I live nowhere near nor have ever been to Canada. Forgive me because I have no fing clue as to what I am talking about.

Chapter 14: Let the Games Begin

X23 had pealed out on Logan's bike at three o'clock that morning when she left for the second time. This time, there would be no looking or going back. She'd tried to play it their way, _his_ way, and inaction just didn't suit her. She'd spent a majority of her existence on the run, trying to change that now was like trying to make lead into gold. She'd taken all the cash she could find in the house put on her uniform, and booked it out as fast as she could. If you had seen her, moving through the house quickly, quietly, and with a purpose, you would have stayed out of her way. The look in her jade-hued eyes was as cold and dead as her hear was right now. If she bothered to scream ou the pain she felt, she was afraid she might never stop. So, her heart pounding in her chest from anger she turned her back and left.

She'd remained pissed all the way to the Canadian border. Once in, surrounded by the woods and venturing into the mountains she breathed a visible sigh of contentment. This was her element, her territory. She could thrive here, maybe…no, no point to thinking to the future. She dumped the bike halfway to where she needed to be and took off into the woods. Again, she breathed in the soft scent of the earth. She felt the warm brush of air against her face, whipping her hair in all directions. She opened her eyes, calm overcoming her for the first time in a long time. She'd never admit it but she felt safe here, like she was…home. She purposely strode into the woods, a death mask grimace of a grin on her face.

The game was on.

* * *

"Gauntlet, kindly keep up, she's moving again." Omega Red barked behind him in as quiet of a whisper as he could manage. After all, the point wasn't to hide their position from her, for now. Right now all they were trying to do was keep up with their target, not an easy task. They'd already lost her twice. It was eerie how easily she moved here, how well she blended into the woods. She fit here, and it made her that much more dangerous having an advantage like that. "I do no like the direction she's heading in. You don't think…?"

"That she's trying to get caught maybe?" Gauntlet stared passively in the direction of the quarry.

"I do not trust this, but we have no choice. Now keep up." he growled and quickened his pace in order to keep up. Again, he almost couldn't see her. Gauntlet quietly followed.

* * *

Logan stared taciturnly at the ground moving below him in splashes of bright green smudged with brown. The harsh wind of the high altitude sought to suck the precious oxygen from his lungs. He could breath, but barely. The cold wind churned around him whipping his short tufts of hair back from his face to snap in the wind. He wouldn't admit it, but he wasn't too sure about what he was about to attempt, mostly jump out of a jet from very high up. He couldn't use a parachute for fear he might alert some unsavory character of his presence, or more importantly alert X23 that he was there. Taking one last look around the relative safety of the jet, he let out a long breath of air, then squashed a helmet on top of his head and let himself fall out of the doorway he'd previously been standing in.

With nothing to slow his descent he fell fast and hard. The ground loomed immediate and intimidating in his vision. He fell spread-eagle trying to maximize on his surface area in order to slow himself somewhat. Near the end of his fall, he curled himself into a ball trying to keep from injuring too many internal organs. Bones he could easily regenerate in a couple of minutes, massive amounts of bleeding, not so much. He slammed into the first tree a couple of seconds later. Branches gave way with ease as his mass smashed through the canopy like a cannonball. It took all of his control not to uncurl himself as he hurtled towards the ground. He tried to twist into a better landing position, but an unexpected tree branch slammed into him spiraling out of control. He hit the ground making a dent in the soft loam that carpeted the shaded forest floor.

Logan moaned and tried to crawl towards a tree. Eventually he got there and put his back against it so that nothing could sneak up behind him. He'd definitely injured his shoulder in the fall and it seemed to be taking an abnormally long time to heal. Hearing a noise to the right of him, he scuttled to cloister himself inside a rotting log that was nearby.

"C'mon you stupid arm, heal already." He growled at his broken shoulder and elbow. Suddenly he ground himself hanging upside down by his ankles, a tight cable of a strange alloy twisting painfully around his ankles cutting off his circulation.

"Well, well, well, look what we've caught Gauntlet." Omega Red turned to discover his partner engaged in a battle with X23. He fired at her with no result except making gauges in the grass. X23 slammed into Omega Red so hard that Logan went swinging into another tree. At least Omega Red was knocked unconscious for the time being.

"Move!" X23 growled hauling him to his feet. Logan winced and hobbled after her.

"What's the matter with you?"

"Fell out of a plane." Logan gasped at her.

"Yeah, well that was pretty stupid. Why aren't you healing?"

"Hey I ain't as young as I used ta be." Logan whispered defensively.

"Well, you're just going to slow me down. Go home Logan."

"Not until I talk to you."

"I don't have time for this!" They both stopped and had a brief glaring contest. It ended with X23 muttering, "Just leave me alone." And turning away. Logan, who'd finally healed quietly just followed her.

* * *

X23 appeared as a green silhouette in Gauntlet's sight. He knew he'd be no match for both of them combined. He knew he'd be no match for both of them combined. He'd have to wait them out. He gave an audible sigh and moved off to find Omega Red.

* * *

Logan and X23 made their way deeper into the heart of the woods. Logan had eventually healed, but he still moved stiffly as if he were still in pain. He was constantly alert, sniffing the air at every other step. Something wasn't right. X23 plunged ahead, unaware and uncaring of her surroundings. Apparently, when X had a score to settle nothing else mattered. Logan reached out and grabbed her arm not caring when her eyes narrowed dangerously.

"Hang on a sec. Something's not right. This feels like a trap. Wherever you're going, you need to calm down and use your instincts. You can't just burst in "guns blazing," you're just going to end up hurt." X23 shrugged off his arm and stoically pressed on, obviously no interested in sage advice. Logan sighed, rolled his eyes, resisted the urge to stick his tongue out at her or worse, kick her in the ass, and then carefully followed. At least _he_ could try and be alert enough for the two of them.

* * *

Gauntlet and Omega Red had abandoned following X23 and now moved in a more offensive direction. Omega Red was now the one who moved slowly and had he been any other "side kick" Gauntlet might have gloated. As it were, he ran ahead and peered down from their vantage point of a large cliff. It bulged in odd places making lots of nooks and crannies that could be used for them to hid or easily make their way down.

"Do you see them?" Omega Red whispered, anticipation oozing out with every word. Gauntlet ignored him and focused in on their prey.

"300 meters to go, be ready." With that, he moved off to mimic Omega Red's actions of prying off a large chunk from the cliff's face.

* * *

"X, will you slow down? This doesn't feel right!" Logan yelled at the back of a girl who still strode purposefully ahead. He was beginning to wonder if she might actually want to get caught. As they approached the narrow gorge ahead, walls of rock began to gradually close them in. Every nerve in Logan's body screamed at him to run, fast and far. Before he could voice his opinions of the situation again, a large shadow engulfed X23. He looked up and began to move, because as he looked back he realized X23 wasn't going to. He lunged at her pushing her out of the way and catching the back of his legs in the crushing blow. He bellowed in pain and anger and immediately began to try and get up. X23 slightly stunned wavered as she too gained her feet. More rocks began to fall and she had no choice but to run as Gauntlet and Omega Red herded her towards a narrow alcove that had her completely cornered. Gauntlet calmly approached her and as she lunched for him slapped one of her own discs on her forehead, sending an electric surge through her body potent enough to even drop her.

Omega Red still loomed above Logan's helpless form grinning town menacingly at him. Logan continued to try and stand. Omega Red dealt a harsh blow to Logan's head and then began to move the rock off of him. He then proceeded to pick him up and toss him over the edge of the cliff. He couldn't help it; he indulged himself in a good laugh. He turned to find Gauntlet staring oddly at him. "Omega and Friends one, X-Geeks, zero." Was all he would say in explanation. Gauntlet merely shrugged, an odd gesture considering what he was carrying and then they both turned and proceeded to deliver their package to their employer.

A/N: I know, I know not a very long chapter, but it's something after so long. That's better than nothing right?I'd also like to state that I know nothing about jumping out of planes, so um…I hope what I know about physics compensated a little. All right, hopefully I'll have time some time to write more.

Oh and I have helped create a website so um…heh heh, Episodic wanna give em the url, please, pretty please….Lauren? Hey come back here!

Yeah, I'll look it up for next time. Hope you all come and visit!


	15. Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep

Wow, so this is my last chapter. sniffles So I wanted to take a brief moment here to thank some very important people. First and foremost, I would like to thank **Episodic **for continual support and suggestions and just plain entertainment at times. I'm glad I got the guts to email you and I feel I have met someone really cool because of it. Also, **Curliest Guru** for being one of my best friends and reading this fic even when you have no fing clue what is going on. I promise I'll get you over to my house so you can see X2 eventually. **Lolita Red** if you're still reading or even out there, I enjoyed very much when you reviewed and I enjoyed your fic too. I know there are many people that left reviews and I would love to be able to list you all but at the rate I'm going this will end up being longer than my chapter. So thank you to everyone who took the time to read my fanfiction and thank you even more to those that were good enough to tell me what you think. Hopefully I'll have some time to come up with another fic soon, but I may branch on to fictionpress...so look me up there sometime. It should be the same screen name. 

Ok, now that the sappy music has stopped playing and everyone has stopped crying (or not) on with the story!

also, sorry about the messed up format, it would only let me upload this chapter in plaintext for some obscure reason that i can't fathom.

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters that belong to Marvel and X-Men in any way shape or form. I do however, own all those minor little characters that you never have heard of such as Elijah, Jared, that gang of kids that likes egging X23 on, and yeah all of them.

**Chapter 15: Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep**

The droning buzz of medical personnel punctured X23's unconsciousness and brought her gasping to the surface of reality. She fought the urge to violently sit up causing the muscles in her body to begin to cramp from the tension coursing through them. She couldn't let them know that she was awake. She quieted her breathing and slowed her heartbeat. She strained to hear what someone was saying in the background.  
"Are you out of your mind? I said no discs! The damage you may have caused could be irreversible! Do you have any idea what you've done? Never mind, just get up here now and none of your excuses." The young man that had been speaking was a doctor with small square-framed glasses and a crew cut that displayed the planes and angles of his face to their best advantage. He wore freshly creased khakis and a blue button down shirt underneath his lab coat. _Great, a pretty boy_. X23 smiled to herself. _Pretty boys are soft_. She extended the claws on her left hand as quietly as possible on the side hidden by her body and facing away from the doctor. The doctor came closer to her and was making notations on the chart in his hand. She must have done something that gave away that she was awake though because he took a sudden interest in her. Her eyes flew open and she flew at him slashing her claws into the soft, vulnerable flesh of his throat. He gave one last gurgling cry that sounded like a clogged fountain and fell, bleeding to the floor. X23 didn't even watch him fall, she was already out the door, pack slung over her shoulder.

* * *

Wolverine moaned and slowly opened his eyes. He was definitely starting to get pissed off. Luckily for him, when Omega Red had thrown him over the ledge he'd landed on another ledge that jutted out a little lower. He painfully made his way to his feet and began to climb. Eventual he was able to haul his still weak body over the top ledge of the cliff. Logan sprawled on his back and stared up at the clear blue sky. He really was getting too old for this. He groaned and stood up, ripping off the various parts of his clothing that had become torn or shredded. A good deal of his shirt disappeared and the bottom half of his jeans as well. Logan sat on the ledge wearily. He ran his hands through his hair tiredly and contemplated what he was going to do next. Part of him knew that X23 was going to be pissed at him no matter what he decided to do, so he brushed himself off, stood up, and sighed for a final time. He was going to lose his balls when X23 found out he'd helped her.

* * *

X23 was having a hard time getting through the HYDRA base without being noticed. She'd already killed four underlings. She needed to get to the center of the base before she could enact her plan. The base however, was a fucking maze. Even with her keen senses, X23 was having a hard time finding where she wanted to be. The fact that her sloppy kill of the good doctor was only hindering her progress since guards kept swarming around corners and pouring out of doors all of the time. From what she could hear they'd even sent some guards up into the air ducts. Too bad the guards were only searching through the ones in the ceiling.

There was a second set of air ducts that were located near the floor. It was no wonder no one wanted to go into them either; they were absolutely frigid. These air ducts sent concentrated waves of incredibly cold air, almost to the point of ice, down into the lab areas in what seemed to be the very depths of hell known as the HYDRA labs. The cold air kept the frozen specimens down in the lab from thawing out and causing problems. At one point HYDRA had considered putting X23 on ice and would have succeeded had she not taken out half the guards when they tried to put her into an icy grave. HYDRA found her much more cooperative when she wasn't fighting for her life. X23 had to move quickly if she was going to get out of this air vent without developing hypothermia. The air was cold enough to slow even her down. She finally made it to the center of the base after two more rights and a left. In one fluid move she pulled herself out of the duct and gave herself a couple of seconds to warm back up. Then she was moving again. This was going to be the tricky part. She was going to have to move to the base of the five other towers branching off from the circle and then the one directly in front of her would be where she would be. It was going to be a lot of back tracking and X23 didn't like that. Inhaling on a huge sigh, she quickly began what she'd come here to do.

* * *

Logan had made his way to the base and found the entire area in chaos. _Looks like X23's already been let lose on these poor bastards_. Logan thought grimly to himself. He grabbed a guard and yanked a uniform. Then he proceeded to try and find X23. The base was almost confusing because of its simplistic nature. It was a basic spiral and he began to systematically check each part of the base. He didn't have to check far because shortly after he began his search, X23 was practically thrown into him. Whatever she had been doing Omega Red had stopped.

X23 had been going down the third branch when the door to the lab in front of her had exploded outward and Omega Red had come barreling towards her. He'd slammed into her like a semi-truck and sent her crashing into none other than Wolverine. She got to her feet and looked at him, shaking her head and muttering. Logan looked at her, for the first time calmly waiting for the explosion of anger. It never came. Omega Red charged and X23 took off leaving Wolverine to deal with the pissed off Soviet. Omega Red smashed him up against the wall, and he felt his already cracked ribs break. "I will kill you!" Omega Red screamed smashing Logan into the wall again for emphasis. Logan broke Omega Red's hold and fell to the floor gasping for breath. Omega Red's coils slammed into the floor where Logan's head had just been ten seconds earlier. Omega Red growled in frustration. The Soviet was out of control. Logan decided it would probably be better to run and regroup than sit here and get pounded.  
He didn't run fast enough however, and one of Omega Red's coils swiped into his ankles causing Logan to once again fall to the floor. Omega Red planted a huge treaded boot on Logan's head and began to grind his face into the hard metal floor. Logan's nose was definitely broken. When Omega Red was done making Logan's face look like it had been put through a meat grinder, he roared in what he viewed as a victory. Logan sat there quietly waiting for his abused body to catch up and heal. Omega Red extended his coils while he simultaneously flipped Logan over with the toe of his boot. Logan waited for the opportune moment. The coils descended and Logan sprang into action, catching the coils in his hands, he flipped over Omega Red and plunged each coil as deep into his adversary's body as he could manage. The man screamed in agony and collapsed, his own power sucking him lifeless. X23 came running back. She ran up to him and shoved two flat, black discs into his hands.  
"Hours, minutes, seconds." She said indicating the corresponding buttons on the discs. "The first one gets placed at the bottom of the fourth tower and gets set at thirty minutes, fifty-five seconds. The second disc gets placed at the base of the fifth tower and gets set at twenty-seven minutes, thirty-two seconds. Once you've set the fifth disc, run down that corridor there. It will take you to the hangar where there is bound to be some vehicle that you can drive." With that X23 began to head up the sixth branch of the base.  
"X, wait!" Logan yelled at her, but it was too late, she'd already sealed the door behind her. Logan sighed, and resignedly headed up the fourth branch of the base.

* * *

X23 planted the sixth and final bomb that went on the tower and turned, only to slam into someone she'd hoped had gone off to traumatize someone else.  
"Well, well, well, if it isn't my little sister up to no good again I see." Jared had gripped X23's arms and his nails were digging into her flesh painfully. X23 stared in horror at the only person she'd ever felt even slight affection for. The acid that permeated the metal that covered his bones was finally corroding the rest of his system. His body seemed somewhat formless where some of his softer tissues had already begun to liquefy. The acidic blood that flowed through his system was oozing out of his eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and the part where your nails meet your skin. X23 recoiled. It was one of the most horrifying things she'd ever seen, and she'd seen some pretty horrifying things. "Oh my God, Jared!" she couldn't help but exclaim.  
"But you don't believe in God, little X." Jared replied wickedly and shoved her out of his grasp. X23 knew that Jared was gone. The feverish gleam to his eyes told her that there was very little left of the Jared she used to know. Jared charged and X23 barely had time to move out of the way. Jared's state of decay certainly hadn't slowed him down, nor had it weakened him any. He was still so much stronger than she was. He came up behind her and clutched her in a vise like hug that was squeezing the air out of her lungs. She jabbed her elbows back and thrust her arms up to break his hold and extended her claws. She was ready to meet him head on. She didn't have to wait long. He kicked her in the knee and kneed her in the head, sending her once again crashing down to the ground in a daze. His claws were out and heading towards her stomach. X23 scooted away and stood only to catch a claw to her face. One of the gouges went deep, cutting a slash just above and through part of her left eye, causing her to hiss in pain and anger. She was tired of this. X23 ran up the wall and launched herself at him. She landed a blow across his chest, but all the blood that splattered out from the wound burned her. She was lucky that she hadn't gotten any in her eyes. Obviously cutting him up was out of the question.  
"Has the golden child run out of ideas already?" Jared taunted. X23 glared and delivered a roundhouse kick to his head. She proceeded to pummel Jared with as many devastating blows as she could but to little avail. Jared was hard to wound due to the fact that he had gotten so squishy. It was like trying to beat up a wet pillow. On her next pass at him Jared kicked her squarely in the chest and sent her into the wall, which gave way behind her and landed her in a weapon storage room.  
X23 quickly scanned the shelves. Bullets would do her no good. She needed something that would incapacitate him. She found a weapon that just might work. As Jared approached the hold she'd made in the wall taunting, "Come out, come out wherever you are." X23 sprang up framed by the hole in the wall and shot him with a pulse of energy that sent him flying into the wall opposite and into the next room. She didn't know it yet but she was crying. Some of the debris from the wall and the blast and dealt further damage to Jared pinning him in place to the floor. She approached his inert body, careful to avoid the blood pooling around his body. He tried to prop himself up, but for once he couldn't. It was the first time X23 had ever seen him show physical pain. "Why are you crying"  
"Am I?" X23 asked wiping at her face having them come away wet with something other than blood for once. "I guess I am, but I don't know why"  
"You're lying." Jared gurgled up at her, and she tentatively put her hand on his forehead. "Please don't lie to me, not after everything else." X23 couldn't be sure but she thought he might be crying as well.  
"I guess because it's all such a goddamn waste Jared. Look at us, two worthless lives in a meaningless fight partaking in an endless battle to give some meaning to a pointless existence. It makes it all seem so fucking pathetic and yet"  
"Yet you still have hope, ridiculous hope that something better might come along. That there might actually be a reason for you being here"  
"Yeah, I guess"  
"Don't cry for me X, cry for you and all the others, but don't cry for me. I was a warped soul in a twisted body, and I made it my life goal to hurt others. I was a monster, both inside and out. I don't deserve anyone's tears, especially not yours"  
"Maybe you deserve my tears most of all Jared"  
"Kick HYDRA's ass X"  
"Don't worry, I will." X23 stood and turned to go. Jared lay gasping on the floor. All he could do now was stare at the ceiling and wait. He knew it wouldn't be long...

* * *

X23 moved slowly through this tower, not because she wasn't trying to be seen, but because she just didn't care anymore. Jared may have seen hope in her, but she sure didn't fell like she had any. If a guard approached her, she merely backhanded them into a wall with enough force to knock them out, and she kept walking. She was almost there. She clenched her hands and extended her claws in anticipation. It would all end here.

* * *

Logan had set his final bomb and had been watching it slowly count down the minutes until detonation. He knew he should probably be moving toward the hangar that X23 had told him about, but still...

* * *

"Hello X23. I've been so looking forward to meeting you." The sultry voice hissed out from the darkened corner and X23 merely met the hard green stare with a glazed over one of her own. X23 didn't feel real anymore. She felt like she really had nothing to lose.  
"Why...How could you? People like Jared, they've dedicated their lives to making your visions come true, skewed as they may be, and you just throw them away like old, broken toys. That's what you did, you broke Jared, and all the other children from the Weapon X project; you even broke me"  
"You think so? I don't believe I see a broken woman before me. I think I see the child that will not learn to obey, a child that still throws temper tantrums when things don't go her way; I see a child that has such potential given the right guidance." Madame Hydra said as she extended her own poison-laced claws. "Don't waste your time with petty what ifs and whys X23, you're smarter and better than that. I know you are." Madame Hydra stepped into the light as the floor beneath them shifted. They were going up. Viper, or Madame Hydra, was a stunning specimen and she seemed to personify her namesake in looks. Her eyes seemed to hypnotize just like a snake, and when she smiled, you could see her fangs. "You're not broken X23, but you do need some fine tuning. I can help you, we just want you back, safe and here at HYDRA where we can help you become the best that you can be"  
"I'll save that for the army." X23 growled. Viper moved faster than X23 imagined was possible for her and was stunned to find Viper's claws buried in her sighed.  
"It's a slow-acting poison. I doubt it will kill you, but it sure will making your life a living hell for awhile." X23 snapped and lunged at the woman who had hurt so many people she cared about, the woman who had denied her so much. Viper hadn't expected X23 to fight. The poison should have slowed her down, hindered her ability to fight but she was still going strong. X23 launched a furious string of attacks that moved Viper further into the room. Suddenly Gauntlet appeared.  
"Go. I will take care of her and bring her to you." Viper nodded and took off for her escape pod.

10...

Logan had moved off toward the hangar and now stood on a hill waiting a couple miles away from the base. It was all he could really do.

9...

X23 didn't even bother with Gauntlet. She pushed him out of the way and shoved a bookcase on top of him, pinning him to the floor.

8...

Viper climbed aboard her ship and screamed at the the piolets to take off without even closing the door first.

7...

X23 ripped off her jacket and kept running as fast as she could.

6...

The ship was up ahead. She was not religious but she found herself pleading with some higher power to give her the strength to make it.

5...

She synchronized the charges.

4...

She made it to the roof and took a tremendous leap. Below on the hill Logan watched in horror as he finally, finally understood.

3...

Viper cried out in panic as X23 landed in the cabin, bombs strapped to her chest.

2...

Jared stared at the ceiling and on his dying breath he whispered so quietly that no one even heard, "Freedom."

1...

"Game Over, bitch."

The resounding explosions that took place simultaneously throughout the HYDRA facility nearly blinded Logan. His chest was tight and he didn't think he was breathing.  
"X!" He yelled as loud as he could, over and over until he could only cloak feebly. He'd never felt so overwhelmed and panicked. He watched with a passive face as rescue teams responded to what was already being labeled a terrorist attack. Apparently HYDRA had a good enough front for what was supposed to be housed in that building. The sun was nearly setting as the X-Jet landed nearby and the professor wheeled himself to sit besided Logan.  
"She's wrong you know"  
"About what, Logan"  
"If I had known, I would have helped her. I would've helped all of them"  
"We all would have, and I think she knew that, but, perhaps this was not your fight to win"  
"Yeah. Charles"  
"Yes Logan"  
"Let's go home."

THE END


End file.
